5 Keys to Success

After reflecting on the things that I've been doing well and not so well, as well as considering some of the recent blog comments that I've received, I've noticed a pattern and I've come up with 5 things that lead to success for me with my Kung Fu. This post is intended to act as a road map of sorts for when I need to find my way out of a slump.

1) Acts of Kindness: When I perform AOK it completely transforms my mindset. The kinder I am to others, the kinder I am to myself and I am more open to doing the things that are important, like eating well, training, etc. It's a perpetual thing because kindness begets more kindness. AOKs are a good indicator (at least for me) of my overall engagement.

2) Diet: This is pretty simple. When I eat well, my body and mind respond accordingly. I don't think it's possible to sustain a high level of performance over time without a good diet. For me a good diet means I'm eating less processed foods, more vegetables, and drinking lots of water. 

3) Stretching: I started including stretching with my I Ho Chuan requirements a couple of months ago and it's really paid off. My flexibility has obviously improved and my body feels so much different. High kicks and low stances require flexibility and you can't beat the way a good stretching session makes you feel. I totally get the appeal of yoga now.

4) Getting An Early Start: The times that I am the most successful are the times that I am able to get in some reps first thing in the morning. The rest of the day is so much easier when you know that you have already completed 50 situps. Leaving it until the end of the day is a recipe for failure. I know that because that is still how I do it most of the time. There have been days that I get all my reps done before noon and those are inevitably the days that my numbers are super high and somehow I also have time to do other things as well. 

5) Journaling: If I look back at the times where I was in a really good place and highly engaged, I see that I more than met the minimum requirement for journaling. Conversely, there have been months where I barely met the minimum and those were months that I wasn't doing so well. This is not a coincidence. Journaling, for me, serves two purposes. It helps me organize my thoughts and also solicit advice from my teammates. More importantly, it documents my journey, and this allows me to go back and learn from my own failures and successes. Sifu Brinker talks to us constantly about journaling but I have never needed to be convinced. I have always understood the value in it.

I find that if I do all the things above, everything else falls into place. These things create a framework for me, physically and mentally, that I can build on each day. I'll be the first to admit that even with this framework, things are seldom easy. But hopefully writing this down will be one more tool that I can use when things get tough.

Diet and an Injury Update

I've come to realize that a proper diet is crucial. I've always paid attention to my nutrition, even if it was poor, and I've always been interested in learning about how food affects the body. I hadn't been eating well over the last month or so and I don't think it's a coincidence that my training and attitude deteriorated along with my diet. I've turned things around a bit over the last couple of days and I already feel a difference. One of my personal requirements was to eat vegetables more regularly and I've only sporadically done so. It's something I need to keep working on as I can see tangible results when I eat well.

I've been seeing a new physiotherapist for a few weeks now and so far so good. In our first session she was already able to improve my range of motion. One of the thing that she told me is that my alignment is all messed up. In my relaxed state, my head tilts left and my shoulders are not square. I have been given a series of stretches and exercises to improve my alignment and improve my range of motion. After those improve we'll work on strength. The interesting thing to me is that it seems obvious that some of the issues I have in kung fu with body alignment are directly related to my injury. It just goes to show how important it is to attend to injuries.

Frustration

I've been wanting to write a journal entry for a couple of days but I didn't because my mindset was a bit negative and I wanted to wait until I shook it off. Well, that hasn't happened yet and I suppose the negative posts serve a purpose, just the same as the positive ones. I can look back and remember how I felt when I was low and also remember that it didn't last forever. You have to remember where you've come from to appreciate where you are. 

So, with all that said - I'm very frustrated right now. Things were going so well for me and now I feel like I've taken several steps back. On a personal level things are not great at the moment and it's affecting every other part of my life. I remember a while back, Sifu Brinker was speaking about people letting their Kung Fu deteriorate because they didn't have time or their life was sapping their motivation. What those people didn't realize is, when your life is chaotic or turning downward, that's when Kung Fu is the most important. I understood what he said back then but I'm sure not practicing that now.

I've been feeling "meh" for a while now but I had temporarily pushed it down. It's creeping back and I don't know how to deal with it. I still struggle with finding meaning in almost everything. I feel like an outsider wherever I go and whatever I'm doing, and it's starting to wear on me. I think I need to make some kind of change in my life but I don't know what. At least not yet.

Difficulties

Life has a habit of getting in the way. The last week has been difficult for me in that I’ve had a hard time fitting my training into my days. This obviously means that I haven’t done a very good job of taking advantage of my opportunities. Too much time wasted time on the internet, too much procrastination, and most of all - laziness has crept into my routine. I feel like there is a fine line between not beating yourself up for missing a class/training, and being complacent. I’ve worked hard to get rid of the guilt that I was feeling previously but now I feel like I have swung too far in the other direction. I have to find that balance where I take advantage of the times that I can train but I don’t sweat the times that I don’t.

I’ve often felt that, in the past, I’ve been too accepting of putting in a mediocre effort. Some people are perfectionists and I used to view myself (at times) as a “good enough-ist”. I don’t feel that way anymore but old habits die hard. It seems like every day I’m reminded that training your mind is way harder than training your body.

I Ho Chaun - Tool or Mountain?

Sifu Brinker has spoken many times about the idea of seeing the I Ho Chuan as a tool and not as a mountain to climb. I've always understood what he meant but I think I'm only just now starting to feel that way myself. Last class I received my green stripe, which was the last one I needed in order to get ready to grade for my yellow belt. The problem was that I didn't really feel like I deserved most of the stripes I have. I haven't always understood exactly what I did to earn a particular stripe. I think this is for two reasons. First, my instructor knows what a white belt skill level should look like, whereas I do not. I need to trust Sifu Playter's judgment. Second, I had a hard time understanding how I could be progressing when I wasn't practicing as much as I thought I should. But participating in the I Ho Chuan has changed the way I train. A lot of my training comes from form reps. I only viewed this as practicing one thing, but in actuality, forms train many aspects of my kung fu, all at once. If I improve my forms, there's a good chance I'm also improving my stances, my center, timing, flow, etc.

I've realized that just working toward getting all my requirements each day has been enough to continue progressing. I know that I am not hitting all my requirements and my consistency needs to improve but that's ok. I will improve as I go on. In the meantime, it's quite clear that the I Ho Chuan has been serving me. I'm been taking stock of where I'm at and I'm quite happy. I don't always feel like it, but I'm a kinder person these days. My attitude behind the wheel has done a complete 180 (maybe closer to 160 actually) and I feel calmer than I ever have before. My body is more flexible and I feel in better shape than I've been in a long time. All of these improvements have carried over into work as well. I have a challenging job right now but I'm having success, in large part to my application of some of the principles that kung fu has taught me.

To clarify - I'm not saying that I'm an expert or that any of this is easy. I'm just saying that I don't feel like this is an ordeal for me. It's something that has already changed the way I do things and I've only scratched the surface.

Numbers Update

I thought now would be as good a time as any to revisit my numbers and see where I'm at.

	Completed	Remaining
Push Ups	4345	45655
Sit Ups	11055	38945
KM	34	1575
Da Mu Hsing Reps	334	666
Kicks	9720	15280
Acts of Kindness	165	835

As you can see, I have a long way to go. I looked at my tracking spreadsheet to see if I could see any patterns beyond the obvious (not getting in enough reps) and this is what I found:


My sit-ups have been pretty consistent. Since I really started doing well tracking my numbers in June, there have only been three times where I went more than two days without doing sit-ups, and that includes my summer holidays. I'm actually pretty happy with that.


Kicks and Form reps are another story. There were eight times where I went more than two days without doing forms, including a twenty day stretch. If I ever question why I haven't achieved my yellow belt yet, there's the answer. Kicks were almost as bad. What this comes down to is that I am missing an opportunity to build a foundation with the basics. I have not been consistent enough.


My KM could be higher but I haven't been counting anything other than a specific effort to run/walk/bike, etc. I haven't counted any day to day walking around. I've been told that it's ok to do so but it doesn't feel right to me. Maybe I'm wrong. Either way, running hasn't been a priority. I tried to start but I hate it and I didn't make it a priority.


Pushups will improve after my shoulders are better. I have a new physiotherapist that I'm seeing so hopefully it's all uphill from here. I have more good days than I had before but I still have a lot of healing to do.


My two big takeaways from this analysis are:
1) Consistency. If I was able to bang out even one form rep and twenty kicks on those days where I did none, I would have much better results. Something is always better than nothing and I have had too many days where I did nothing.
2) Regardless of the fact that I know I could have done better, I'm still pretty impressed when I look at what I've done. When I joined SRKF a year ago, I couldn't do a set of ten sit-ups. Now I can do a set of 50 and I've done 11,000 in the last seven months. I definitely appreciate how far I've come.

Overconfidence

I feel like I've maybe been a bit overconfident lately. Mentally, I've been in a really good place and I've felt like training hasn't been a lot of effort recently. My shoulders have been a bit better and I was pounding out a lot of situps, which when I was starting out, were tough for me to do. The Forms Seminar was a really good day for me and I had a lightbulb go off for me that afternoon. 

When we had our team meeting on Saturday Sifu Brinker asked who was having trouble and I didn't put up my hand. I still don't really feel like I'm having trouble but I'm realizing that keeping momentum is not easy. I tried to pump out 1000 Situps and Kicks last weekend but I ran out of gas on Sunday. I was a bit sore as a result and I haven't done much training for a few days. One of the things that I've been getting better at is recognizing slumps right away and trying to stomp them out right away. Keeping up with my journaling and training while working out of town is pretty challenging for me but it's definitely helping to tune my mental game.