February 2016 – Progress with Kata

Surprise!  I’m publishing outside my normal pattern for awhile.  Stay tuned throughout the week – I’m on a roll!  February 2016’s biggest lesson was about my own learning process.  I’m going to break this down into sub-themes.  Today, let’s trace my progress with Bassai Dai kata by looking at my journal entries…

150115_Cottage2/2/16 – Home Dojo

I performed Bassai Dai kata in front of the class.  I’m not nervous in front of my classmates, but it’s still good practice to perform kata when/where there’s no place to “hide,” LOL. I learned the first half of my performance is “all there.”  Second half – I need to be way more confident and really show I know exactly how I’m destroying my enemies.

Tournament in 12 days!  Gotta really buckle down on that!!!  I can do this!!!

graduation-hat-cap-md2/10/16 – College Dojo

“The dwarf breathes so loudly we could have shot him in the dark.”
– Haldir (The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien)

Every once in awhile College Sensei likes to show the newbie white belts (vast majority of the class every quarter) what Karate looks like at different belt levels.  This also gives us colored belts a chance to practice under simulated tournament conditions.  Today, Sensei had the three of us who are competing on Sunday perform our katas solo in front of the whole class.  As a bonus, we got feedback after.

College Sensei warned me to not get into the bad habit of using loud breathing as a crutch or a substitute for generating power with my body while performing kata.  He’d like me to tone it down, as it’s frowned on by tournament judges.

I had no idea I was doing this.  Nobody’s pointed it out to me before, and it never occurred to me to listen to myself 😉

150430_Medal2/14/16 – Tournament

Third Place Ladies 35 and Older (I was the “and Older,” LOL) Intermediate/Advanced Kata.

Now that I’ve memorized the Pinan series of kata and Bassai Dai, I had a lot of fun watching folks from other styles of karate perform their katas 🙂

 

150115_Cottage2/18/16 – Home Dojo

Given that I’m going to be the highest-ranked student at College Dojo (our brown belt helper moved away), I approached my Sensei before class tonight with a question I traditionally ask when I think I might be ready to test for my next belt, “What do I need to work on with an eye towards testing for my next belt?”  Usually I ask this question closer to the date!

I could tell by the smile on Sensei’s face that he was tickled pink.

Every single time, the answer has been, “You’re good to go.”  But this time was different.

“Relax your shoulders.  Get your speed up.”

Argh.  Things that have been plaguing me for-ev-er…

How many black belts over the course of about a year have said to me, “Relax your shoulders?” I reckon close to twenty.  It’s so bad that at Gasshuku (camp) last summer one black belt sneaked up behind me and grabbed me by the shoulders – he started massaging instantly to prevent me putting an elbow in his gut.  But the point was well taken.  I wish I’d had a massage from every black belt who’s told me to relax my shoulders, LOL!  I’ve been to seminars on body mechanics.  I’ve been to classes under three black belts where the focus was on body mechanics.  I’ve been very slowly improving.  But not as fast as I’d like.

But Sensei wasn’t going to stop at just telling me what he wanted before class.  Early on in class, he lightly tapped the tops of both my shoulders simultaneously and said, “Relax.”  He continued, “There, see?  Your shoulders went down.  Tight shoulders are scrunched up.”

OH!  Light bulb!!!

Throughout class Sensei threw me bones both personally and with tips to the class at large.  Everything I’ve ever heard before.  We moved up and down the floor with sparring basics.  Then we did flow drills involving each of us moving between two rows of people holding the big foam shields and we took turns punching or kicking each shield.  We finished up with a basic kata, then we broke up into kata groups.

Sensei told me to work by myself because the others my rank don’t know Bassai Dai even though they’ve been training much longer than I have.  He took charge of them himself.

I’ve had fleeting moments where I’ve felt fluid and what I can only describe as “free.”  But never throughout an entire kata.  I think that’s why Sensei didn’t have me teach the others – he wanted me to apply what I’d been working on all class to the kata.

Sensei’s wife was with us in class again, and she does a wonderful job with the new white belt kiddos 🙂  So neither my Sempai nor I had to worry about teaching.  She will be coming in once a week from here on out, and she will be part of our advanced training.

I’m immensely grateful to both Senseis for making tonight’s lesson happen for me!

150115_Cottage2/28/16 – Home Dojo:  Advanced Class

Big brother has a cold, so he couldn’t make it today.  I had two black belts all to myself for 90 minutes of butt kicking fun.  Oh. my. gosh.  What an honor and a privilege!

So…  Picking the biggest of the many takeaways… Gosh it was hard to choose, but I’d have to say it’s something everyone’s been telling me to do and I haven’t done it.

Make and watch a video of yourself.

And everyone’s right.  It’s an eye opener.  That worked both for seeing the things I need to work on and the things I’m actually doing pretty well.

So  – Bassai Dai kata needs work.  But there are some things I’m doing pretty well 🙂

******************

And I’m continuing to learn.  My techniques are faster due to my looser shoulders, but now I’m working on making distinct stops in between each technique so that the kata as a whole doesn’t look rushed.  To do that, I’m learning to use my breathing to drive the cadence.  Of course I’m also working on form, showing bunkai, etc. etc. etc.  I’ve another tournament coming up soon, then I’m hoping to be allowed to try for a pretty new belt at the end of the month!

More than improving my kata, I also learned some deeper lessons.  I was able to take a barely-learned advanced kata (Bassai Dai) to tournament and did OK with it.  I noted that I had enough experience with a few kata to have fun watching people from other styles perform them.  I started getting in touch with the internal goings-on with my body during kata – namely with breathing and unnecessary tension.  And I learned to listen to the experience of others and do it even if I’m skeptical (ex: make a video).  There’s more to this Karate stuff than meets the eye!

February 2016 Distilled

distillation-mdAn online acquaintance challenged me and others to look for and document the new things we learned from each class during the month of February 2016.  We were to write about our personal “takeaways” from every class we attended – whether it be a new technique, finally getting a handle on something, or even something more nebulous like a new appreciation for a classmate’s talents.  Not just takeaways, but something that distinguished that class from all the other time we’ve ever spent on the mats.  This was a very time consuming exercise for me because I love narrative.  I’m sure it was also time consuming for my online audience ( +James Bullard and +Jackie Bradbury ) to have to read all that!  I am very grateful for their support.

Because I trained 25 out of 29 days I wrote quite a bit.  This is a good thing because now I have plenty of material for this blog.  So I was thinking about how I can edit down this narrative journal into four to six blog posts.  Further thought led me to an interesting exercise.  “Distill” the material.  I created a very simple spreadsheet and read through February’s journal.  As I went along and after I finished reading I created labels for the themes I saw.

Here’s how 25 learning opportunities (classes, seminars, and tournament) broke down…

My personal process of learning: 11 lessons

Relationships between me and other karateka: 7 lessons

Attitude: 6 lessons

Teaching other students: 5 lessons

Oops, that’s 29 lessons and I only trained 25 out of 29 days (leap year).  I can explain the bad math – it’s not due to multiple concussions!  I allowed myself leeway for the tournament weekend, which included a good bit of physical labor all three days, four hours of seminars on Saturday and the tournament itself.  Special events like this really do give one a boost.

So by the numbers, February 2016’s biggest lesson was about my own learning process.  I am on my own timetable – I might learn some things faster than others or slower than others.  But that’s OK as long as I’m making progress.  I saw how I was stretched and pushed and shaped by my instructors.  I recorded triumphs over old weaknesses and discoveries of new strengths.  And yes, new weaknesses cropped up.  I started trusting more and more that I have the capacity to grow in skill and knowledge.  I’m also grateful for the guidance along the way.

When I first started this challenge I had no idea that February would be such a pivotal month for me.  I am very glad I have these lessons and events recorded.  To summarize:  I’m moving better, I’m now Sempai to College Dojo, and Home Dojo Sensei started an advanced class.  Quite a month for me!  I’ll share more in future posts, grouping journal entries together by theme and sub-theme to show my progress in a particular aspect of Karate over the course of a month.

My Empty Cup

160101_EmptyCup

“Empty your cup so that it may be filled; become devoid to gain totality.”

― Bruce Lee

I hear the groans and see the eyes rolling.  Yes, you.  You’ve read and heard this quote so often that now you just want to stun me with a kick to my jaw, follow up with a sweep and punch me a couple of times for good measure as I fall to the mats.  Well that’s already happened to me, so too bad – you missed your chance to be the first to wipe that smile off my face 🙂

So now you’re sitting back and thinking you’ll waste a few minutes of your life reading yet another trite and sugary analysis of a cliché.  I hope not to waste your time because I have stories to tell and connections to make.  I freely acknowledge some elements of this post won’t be unique.  But I promise some elements will be.

Probably around the same time the man who would later become the head of the Karate organization I now belong to was exchanging teaching Karate for English lessons, I was about three hundred yards away attending preschool.  I haven’t verified this but it’s quite possible there was at least a few months of overlap between my time at the community college’s preschool and when he got started there.

One day the preschool teachers and interns took us wee ones on a field trip to the ceramics class.  We watched some of the ceramics students mold and shape clay.  I was particularly fascinated with the pottery wheel.  Imagine my joy when I was handed a lump of clay!  I was appalled when my classmates hurled theirs to the floor as hard as they could.  I had somehow missed my teacher’s instruction to do so and didn’t know that was part of the plan.  I had already turned away by the time the other kids put their hand-prints in the flattened clay.  I took my little lump of clay and quietly asked the nearest adult if she could teach me to use the wheel.

She sat me down at the stool and put her hands over mine.  As the clay spun in my hands I watched my little lump change shape.  Then I bent my thumbs in response to my tutor’s pressure, and a dimple appeared.  The dimple grew to a hole.  I was satisfied when the lump became something that resembled a volcano and I asked to stop.  My tutor asked if I was sure – she thought I could do more, but my four year old child’s soul said the work was good just the way it was.  My tutor had enough artistic sensibility to recognize that any more shaping and it would be her work, not mine.

I have a hunch both from home schooling my children and from teaching brand new beginners their earliest lessons that there are many times in which a Sensei will have to say, “This student is good for their level – s/he is not ready for more guidance.  Any more input from me at this point will mean this person will not learn how to push him/herself or recognize when to ask for help.  At some point in the future, I can give more input.”

Unfortunately my little clay volcano was never fired and so it did not survive the ravages of time.  If I remember correctly it lasted only about ten years.  So fast forward roughly 42 years to an adult me working at that very same community college.  The college is a very lively place so I get tons of emails about campus events.  Imagine my joy when I read that some of the ceramics students would be selling their work!

I knew what I wanted to purchase.  An Asian-style cup.  Yes, because of Bruce Lee’s quote.  I knew I had a good chance of getting one given the 500 some-odd International students who  I serve in the International Student Programs office and given the many more American-citizen students who have ethnic backgrounds from around the world.  I found the “perfect” cup.

160101_EmptyCupI deliberately chose an imperfect cup.  There are places where the glazes are patchy or where they dripped and ran.  I like that.  It shows a real human being made it, not just some machine that chugs out thousands of look-alikes.  This cup reminds me nobody’s perfect.  Of course a master potter could’ve done a better job.  But the whole idea behind Bruce Lee’s “empty cup” is for us to always be students. This cup is obviously the work of a student, and so is a perfect reminder for me to keep on learning – not just in Karate, but also in life.

So now at least five days a week, my Karate is being molded and shaped by Senseis who learned from Yoshida Sensei, the man who, while I was shaping my little lump of clay, might have been a couple hundred yards away teaching Karate or learning English.  Certainly my little preschool self would never imagine the things I think about when I look at my cup every morning when I get up.

When I look at my empty cup I remember the kindness of the Ceramics teacher or student who sat me down at the potter’s wheel.  I remember that she recognized when to stop.  I remember telling the story to the people who took my money and wrapped my cup in newspaper, and how one of them said I could always pick right up right where I left off 🙂  Maybe some day I will.  I do know someone who has time for both pottery and Karate 🙂  When I look at the cup I purchased from the college I remember that once upon a time there was a young man with a dream about coming to America, a man whose Karate students are now teaching me, a man whose story inspired me to apply for the job I now have helping the college’s International students.  And yes, of course, I remember what good ol’ Bruce Lee said and I try to approach every single day with an “empty cup” mindset – being open to whatever lessons the day has to offer.

Because one never knows what connections are being shaped and how even the simplest acts of kindness and generosity can affect others.

More Betterer Part IV – Physical

Click Here to read Part I

6kyuVSshodan

What will be the physical differences between who I am now and who I will be if I’m granted the rank of Shodan?  Every single class I see how others who are better than I am do things.  I am constantly challenged in very specific ways to improve what I do.  I know I don’t look nearly as good now as I will years from now if I’m invited to test for Shodan.  So I watch those who outrank me, I listen to them, I practice, and I have to trust the process that will get me there.

By the time I am invited to test for Shodan, I want to have reached the following goals:

1) Lose ten more pounds
2) Be able to do at least 30 pushups
3) Nice deep stances (if deep is called for)
4) Better endurance – particularly in highly “cardio” activities

I’d like to reach these goals sooner rather than later!  Other physical things that should happen by the time I’m invited to test for Shodan include:

1) Great form
2) Optimal execution of all techniques
3) Gi-popping awesome speed (when speed is needed, of course)
4) Loose when and where I need to be loose, tight when and where I need to be tight

In a nutshell, I should be stronger, better, faster, have more endurance, and I should look pretty gosh darned awesome when I’m doing Karate.

How am I going to get there?  Detailing everything would take me quite some time.  Nutshell summary…  I have to be flexible and clever about when and how I train.  I have my “home” dojo, but one hour twice per week is not enough.  I am very fortunate to be part of a larger organization that includes three other “sister” dojos within reasonable driving distance of my house.  I also take advantage of my YMCA membership and do some supplemental exercise.  Once I reach 3rd kyu, I will be expected to drive out of state for training once each month.  This period will last a minimum of three years, and then maybe I might be invited to test for Shodan.

How long is this going to take me?  The time-frame I’m looking at to reach Shodan is roughly seven years from now, give or take a year or two.  The average in our organization is 8 to 10 years.  Really, though, the exact number of years is not important – what’s more important is Bruce Lee’s maxim about being a little bit better today than I was yesterday.

And being a little bit better today than I was yesterday is something that must not stop at Shodan.  In other words, I should always strive to be more betterer.

So that wraps up this series of posts [UPDATE – for now!]  I get the idea there are things I’m completely clueless about and depths I haven’t even begun to sound.  Those of you with more years under your belts, please feel free to burst any bubbles I might have.

October 2021 UPDATE – Click here for More Betterer V

More Betterer Part III – Mental

Click Here to read Part I

Mental - as in crazy, as in mad cow disease... Oh, never mind.
Mental – as in crazy, as in mad cow disease… Oh, never mind.

Yes, I know – the title of this post loans itself well to the British synonym for “crazy.”  And maybe I am a bit crazy.  Other ladies my age are comfortably doing safe things like Zumba and swimming.  Ah well, “normal” is merely a setting on the dryer…

Initially I had some trouble thinking of how different I will be mentally at Shodan vs. where I am now.  Of course I came up with really off-the-wall wacky stuff to joke about – things like floating in the air while doing meditation and bending spoons without touching them.  But it took me awhile to come up with the idea that I’ll have had loads of practice dealing with the “inner demons” I’ve already encountered.  So when I encounter them again (and again and again) I’ll have loads of experience to draw on.

I’m just going to name some of these “inner demons.”  I’m sure they’re familiar to all of us and none of us like to dwell on them…

1) Imposter syndrome
2) Self doubt
3) Negativity
4) Giving respect even when it’s hard to give it
5) Fear
6) Discouragement
7) Exhaustion (mental and physical)
8) Injury
9) Juggling family, work, and Karate
10) Impatience
11) Anger
12) Remembering the battle is not with the other guy (or gal) but within me

I know, this is not an exhaustive list and it’s all kinda nebulous – some of these merge into others.  We face down a lot of our inner demons on the mats.  Sometimes the battle is silent and sometimes it’s there for everyone to see and hear.  I don’t think dealing with these things will get any easier, it’s just that over time, and certainly by the time I reach Shodan in roughly 7-10 years, I’ll have had more practice.

My online acquaintance, Mr. James Bullard confirmed my idea and added his experience,

“The bad news is, you’ll probably be facing those demons for most, if not all, of your time in the martial arts.  The good news is, they get smaller (or maybe you get “bigger?”) the further you go.”

I like the idea of me getting bigger.  Not long ago in a post-class lecture, my Sensei briefly touched on a very good reason for being in Karate in the first place: namely, to change one’s self (I’m paraphrasing).  I liken mental development to strengthening the core muscles – our spirits have  “cores” too.  I hope my core will be nice and strong by the time I reach Shodan.

MORE BETTERER PART IV – oh, and feel free to burst any bubbles that might need bursting 🙂