4.2 (February 13)

I have officially been a Black Belt for a week, and it’s been very weird. Bowing at the front of the class, Not being in line and actively participating in class, the title of Sihing, and the Black Belt class on Tuesday have been the biggest changes so far. As time goes on, my “reputation” as a Black belt will grow, so people won’t hesitate as much to ask me a question instead of another Black Belt. More knowledge will also come with time and practice so that will help in that aspect as well. It was very weird bowing in to my first Black Belt class, but I very quickly realized it’s just a normal class. Overall, I’m glad and relieved that this time has finally come, and now a new chapter of my Kung Fu journey begins.

4.1 (February 6)

I am a leader.

     I wasn't always a leader, but the kids classes changed that. I started to do warm-ups more often and every once and awhile I would even run the actual class. These experiences have influenced my school life, as when I am in the shop, I can lead others through things and have a group of people who come to me for help almost always. This is one of many things that teaching the kids classes has helped me with.

What Has Kung Fu Done For Me?

  Kung Fu has been a part of my life for longer than I can even remember. I began my journey in September of 2008, a month before my third birthday. In the last 13 years, lots has come and gone, but Kung Fu has remained consistent the whole time. Over the years, I have seen multiple people give their speeches and receive their Black Belts, and now it’s my turn.

When I looked back to answer this question, it was difficult for me to answer as Kung Fu has been there for my entire life, so as far as I know, Kung Fu has done everything for me. I never knew a life without Kung Fu, so I don’t quite know what kind of person I would be without it. When I first joined, I didn’t know much about anything, as I was just under 3 years old. Compare then to know, and I know a lot more, but I still have so much to learn. That’s what I find the most interesting about my journey through Kung Fu. I could learn as much as I want, but there's always more to learn after that. There is no end to mastery.

 Even if I did achieve mastery, would I still be there the next day? Probably not. Something would be discovered that makes it so that I have years ahead of me before I would achieve mastery again.That is why I like my progress towards Mastery, as I always have something to work on, and my progress is never completely stagnant. There may be some times where I make progress slower than others, but that’s life. 

One of the biggest parts of my Kung Fu journey was not giving up. I didn’t realise this until recently, but I now see how that kind of commitment has spread into every part of my life. Not giving up has been extremely beneficial for me, as it has helped me to overcome countless obstacles in life, and has assisted me in finishing almost everything I do. 

These lessons have been taught to me ever since the very beginning, but I never realised it until I started to teach the kids classes. I realised that I was putting in the mastery lessons and the never giving up lessons into what I taught the kids. This made me realise just how major and important Kung Fu actually was in my life.

That brings us to the present day. Here I am, after all these years, giving my speech. I never thought this day would come, but here we are. I wouldn’t have been able to do it without everyone who supported me through my journey. I’d like to thank the following people for their help through it. My parents for getting me to and from class before I could do it myself, and for being my backbone throughout my whole life. The rest of my family for always being interested in my Kung Fu and keeping me motivated. All of the Sifus and Sihings throughout the years that taught me everything I know today. All the teachers that signed off on me grading for each belt. And my friends that stuck with me through the pandemic and kept inspiring me to keep going.

And now to finally answer the question of What Has Kung Fu Done for Me. It has given me a second family. A group of people that I know fairly well and who I feel welcomed by. A group that I know I can ask a lot of questions to, talk about most things, and have fun with. It is something that I will forever be grateful for and will impact me for the rest of my life. Thank you.

3.49

This will be my last blog of Year of the Ox, as there are only two days left until Year of the Tiger starts. 

The other day I was rewatching the Karate Kid, and this was the first time I watched it and realized that Mr. Miyagi’s teaching style would actually work and isn’t just Hollywood magic. When it got to the infamous wax on/wax off scene, I was following along and doing the motions when I realized that I was almost doing a reverse hooking block. When I realized this, I chuckled and I said to myself “what other moves do I know in this movie.”  It turns out I also knew ‘paint the fence’. Paint the fence is just monkey blocks that go up and down. AfterI finished the movie, I was excited that I found this out, and confused about how I didn’t see it before. I think that figuring this out is a good way to end out Year of the Ox. I’’m now excited to see what I find out during Year of the Tiger!

3.48

Year of the Ox is coming to an end, so it's time to look at everything that's happened this year. All the good, all the bad, all the mediocrity, and all the progress on mastery. 

So lets start with the good. The best apart about my year is passing my Black Belt grading. I had a lot of stress going into it, then it happened and I feel good about it. Do I still have lots of work to do? Yes. Am I working on it? Also yes. Some of my favourite parts of the year was working on the demo, going through all the songs, and seeing how I can shape my forms to fit with all the different songs. Some were definitely easier than others, but the ones that were challenging made me have fun when figuring out how to adapt them. 

Now for the bad. Apart from the schoolwide shutdowns, I have to say that the worse part(s) of the year for me was when I couldn't be at the kwoon to train. I always had lots of respect and admiration for the people who had to be online for all their classes, but I never wanted to do it myself. Now that I have, I have so much more respect for the online guys. Teaching the online kids is also weird, but for a different reason. When I was doing the warm up once, everyone else was muted so all I could hear was myself, and it was kinda eerie. When we were doing stick I had to be extra careful not to hit anything because I didn't have the room I do at the back of the kwoon, I had my basement.

Mediocrity. Something we're all working on eliminating. Something that I didn't do that good on this year. I was a bit late on some of my blogs, so I technically failed that requirement. My other requirements were also inconsistent at times. For the most part, I kept my numbers up, but there were some weeks where I got in less than a days repetitions for the whole week. Not good, but it shows room for lots of improvement.

Mastery. The opposite of mediocrity, something we're all working towards. I felt that my path towards mastery was crystal clear while I was working on my written assignments for the Black Belt grading. There's just something about taking a look deep down inside yourself that makes you feel good and wise about where you're headed.

Year of the Tiger is coming up in a few days, and I'm super excited to "start fresh" without starting fresh. 

3.47

 This past week I was able to go to an in person class on Tuesday, and that was the kids classes. Every other day I was online because I had to quarantine. I'm starting to adapt to doing my classes online, but it was my first time being online for the kids classes. Not being able to interact and help the kids was weird at first, but I kinda got used to it during the last class. Doing stick work in those classes did teach me a very good lesson about spacing, because I was in my basement with my computer 3 feet in front of me and the wall plus couch 3 feet behind me. so space was very limited. When we did the "helicopter" move from the spear form, I kept rotating to try and find a good camera angle that let me do the move without hitting anything. Today is my last day of quarantine, so if everything goes good I will be back in class tomorrow night!

3.46

 This past week my family was on vacation in Mexico, so we did our best to attend to all our classes online. After doing that I realized how different and hard it is compared to in person classes. It has it's pros, like how you can be in class from almost anywhere in the world, but it also has its cons, by being on Wi-Fi that can make a video stream be very choppy and blurry at times. We are now back in Canada, but until we get our Covid test results back we are supposed to isolate at home. So it'll be a bit longer before we're back in person, but being online while others are in person (In Canada, at our house) should prove to be an interesting learning opportunity that I haven't experienced before.