3.28

Yesterday was the first round of preliminary grading for the Black Belt test, and it mostly went the way I thought it would. I knew what parts were going to be better than the others, although I did have a few surprises when it came to the running portion. The forms section went pretty good, and with all the specific feedback given it will be easier then normal to fix my forms, another thing that helps is that most of the advice was applicable across all of my forms. The only downside is that I injured my left shoulder a bit, but it's something that will heal, so I'm not too concerned about it. Other than my shoulder, it was a good day and I'm glad that it happened!

3.27

    Ever since last years candidates became black belts, I have become one of the highest ranking belts in my class, meaning that I stand in that front corner that only the best get to stand in. That comes with expectations, expectations that I feel like I can't live up to at some times. Sometimes I feel like I don't belong in that spot, that I belong a few spots away from it. Most of the time that I feel like this, it is because I am comparing me to other people. The people who have stood in that spot before, and the people who haven't had the chance to stand there yet, I compare myself to them. When I do that, I only look at what they're better than me at, and I completely ignore everything else. In Kung Fu, this kind of thinking is discouraged, you're told to only compare you to your past self. In school, it's almost always the opposite, they want you to compare how you're doing to how everyone else is doing, and it creates competition. Sometimes it can be good competition, the kind that leads to study groups and friends being made, but it can also easily lead to bad competition, the kind that splits people up and creates hatred. That's how I see it at least, others will probably see it differently, and some might see it the same way I do. But either way, I'm trying to compare myself to others less, and compare myself to my past self more. After all, a spot in class is just a spot, and I doesn't matter who else stands there, all that matters is that you are better than who you were the day before.

3.26

 These past two Saturdays have been the first two games for the Edmonton Elks since the teams last game in November of 2019. I didn't realize how much I missed going to a Football game until I got to go to one on the 7th. It was one of the biggest things that Covid took away from us, and I'm very glad that it's back. This got me thinking about other things that Covid took away from me. It didn't take many things, mostly school and Kung Fu, but those mean a lot to me. So while Covid didn't take away many things, it actually took a lot. Kung Fu was the first thing to "come back", as we started online classes right away and got back in person during the Summer of 2020. Although school technically came back after a few weeks, it didn't really feel like a true ending to Grade 9 for me. We didn't do the PAT's though, so that is an upside. When I started in person Grade 10 in August of last year, it felt great, it felt like everything was starting to get back on track. And finally, football came back. I've only missed a handful of home games, so going 21 months in between home games really felt odd. I'm glad these three things are back in my life, as they all mean so much to me. But with the fourth wave and the Delta Variant coming, I feel that some of these might be taking another break fairly soon.

3.25

 Why do I want a Black Belt?

     This is a question that Sifu Brinker asked me during our one on one, and it's a question that I didn't really have an answer for. It's something that I have never really thought about. It is similar to the question "What has Kung Fu done for you?". I joined Kung Fu right before I turned three years old, so I've never had a life without Kung Fu. I haven't had the experiences someone would have without the mental part of Kung Fu, so whenever that question gets asked, all I can say is "I don't know." That's the main reason why I can't answer someone when they ask me why I want a Black Belt, because I don't truly know what Kung Fu has done for me. Around 5-10 years ago, to me the difference between a Black Belt and a non-Black belt was that the Black Belt was the Instructor, and the non-Black belt was the student. That's what I thought the difference was, so if you asked me the same question back then, I would've said that I wanted a Black Belt because I wanted to teach others. I now see that being an instructor isn't the line between Black Belts and Que Belts. The line isn't as much physical as it is mental (although it is still pretty physical). It's more of a next step in your journey in Kung Fu that can lead you wherever you want it to.

That's my answer to the question. I want a Black Belt because it is the next step in my Kung Fu journey.

3.24

 Today my family practiced our 5 applications for the Black belt grading, so I got to try out a few things that have been in my head for a while. Most of my ideas turned out to not work very well, but some of them did, which is a start. I have been thinking about what factors caused most of my ideas to fail, and the only common factor between them all is the difference between the imagination and reality. I can imagine a perfect application that takes out all the limbs at once, but I wouldn't be able to do that in reality. There are some parts of reality that seem to be lacking in the techniques that I think of, like what happens out of my sight, or the actual force required to do something. This is a bummer, because I really liked the potential that some of the techniques had. For the ideas that did actually work, they felt good when I did them, and I can't wait to expand and tune them to the point where I'm 100% confident in them.

3.22

 When we did our practice demo in the I Ho Chuan class this week, I was feeling pretty confident going into it. Once I got up and did my form, I messed up quite a bit, but that just made me want to try a different ending on the second round. The second round was better, and I ended in a better spot, but I still messed my form up a bit. This showed me how much work I still need to put into the form, not only to continue adding to it but to also increase my confidence in my ability to do it. This upcoming week my parents will be home so I'll be able to get more feedback, allowing me to improve faster!

3.21

 This week went a bit off plan for me, because of the heat. Instead of training outside doing forms I was inside doing other Kung Fu related things, like the questions for the upcoming Demo video. The forecast for the upcoming week seems to be better, as it averages in the mid twenties. I will make an effort to go outside each afternoon next week to work on my forms at their full size. This is what I wanted to start with last week, but this week works too.