Being part of the UBBT 7 team has changed how I approach my training, my training has brought me to a place that has changed me and how I approach life. Do I need to say more than that? Well, perhaps a little.
At the beginning of the year, I was very sick and could not do anything physical. I wanted to withdraw from the team but Sifu Brinker assured me that we would work it out. At the time, not being able to do anything for three months seemed like a lot of lost time and I questioned how I would reach any of my goals. I wasn't even sure that I could complete the acts of kindness requirement unless being nice to my dogs all day long counted. Sifu Brinker said, Do what you can. So I started slow, real slow, painfully slow, so slow that the seniors at the track were lapping me. I kept on blogging, although it felt like complaining with a little whining mixed in. And I kept up with my written assignments for class. All these things kept me engaged in my training and feeling like I was a part of the team. Being a part of the team was definitely what kept me going when I didn't think that I had it in me to do so. I gradually increased my training until I was doing between two and three hours a day. I am not sure if I would have accomplished as much if I wouldn't have increased slowly, I think that I would have gone charging out of the gates and run out of steam early. I have learned to listen to my body and push hard when I can and take it easy when I have to. I am still amazed at how much training I manage to fit in every day, and I do it because I want to not because I think that I should or that someone else wants me to do it. I like how I feel when I have put in concentrated effort every day to improve my kung fu.
I am learning to control parts of me that I thought were just parts of me that I can't do anything about. Like my feelings, my thought process and changing how you think so that you can have more confidence and try more things. Meditation and learning to consistently give positive messages to myself have made a huge difference in my life. I have learned to release my inner ninja.
I did not reach all of my goals and that is okay. I learned so much from each and everyone of them that I think that they are each a success. The real value in each goal is the journey trying to reach it, not necessarily reaching it. I learned to improve my eye for detail by paying attention to how I was feeling when I did a move or a form. I learned to break down my forms into small pieces so that I could figure how I wanted to move. I learned about working towards mastery when I decided to improve just one of my forms. I learned that I need my training to be a balance between class time, alone time and partner time. This could go on and on but I will stop here. As promised, UBBT 7 has changed me and how I approach my training for the rest of my life.
Until next week, work hard and have fun.
No comments:
Post a Comment