very tired right now. expect more later this week.
pushups this month: 10,990
pushups so far: 16,570
Monday, November 30, 2009
Monday, November 16, 2009
winter wonderland
It really snowed Saturday night, probably a foot by Monday. Sunday after lunch we had a snowball fight, then made snowmen/women and kicked their heads off. It was fun to watch the reactions of students who had never before seen snow.
The training hall is cold enough to see my breath now, but working hard warms me up.
The training hall is cold enough to see my breath now, but working hard warms me up.
Monday, November 9, 2009
the far out east
The martial arts come from very specific cultures and today carry many elements of that. But this leads to some very inaccurate ideas about the cultures themselves.
I hear a lot of martial artists talk about how wrong we do things in the west (and by west, I mean that ethnocentric, mildly racist 'west' of North America and parts of Europe): we dabble too much, are too egotistical or unfocused. Predictably, most of the talk I hear is from western practitioners.
Many of us hold Japan, China, etc. as some mystical land of wisdom and patience. We've frozen this already unrealistic portrait of a culture: after only seeing a few heavily edited bits and pieces we've assumed what's in the rest of the book.
After two months of living here I can say that everything you don't like about our culture is enthusiastically present in China. It's just as much a worry obsessed, consumer whore, shallow hateful culture as back home. There are good bits, of course--just as there's good and bad bits everywhere. My Shifu (ooo, dropping some mandarin spelling on y'all) even complains about how Chinese people don't take care of themselves as well as Westerners.
But let's take it one step further. After all, we're not necessarily talking about your average Chinese citizen. Well, the two Shaolin masters--as in grew up in the real Shaolin temple--I see everyday are, unsurprisingly, pretty human. They aren't stoic, infinitely wise men (it always seems to be men with this stereotype) who stroke beards and mostly grunt. One loves zombie movies, and my Shifu has fairly short temper.
So stop comparing cultures. The martial arts is a product of a certain worldview, yes. But that worldview is not an accurate picture of Oriental culture, both modern or ancient. Consider the rhetoric of medieval European chivalry compared to the brutal and often cruel practices of knighthood. So much smoke for the size of the fire.
At the same time, the martial arts has become a worldview of it's own. Embrace the humility, patience and accountability of our practice rather than a five point exploding palm or any other fantasy we like to tell each other. And don't project some imagined values on a different culture.
I hear a lot of martial artists talk about how wrong we do things in the west (and by west, I mean that ethnocentric, mildly racist 'west' of North America and parts of Europe): we dabble too much, are too egotistical or unfocused. Predictably, most of the talk I hear is from western practitioners.
Many of us hold Japan, China, etc. as some mystical land of wisdom and patience. We've frozen this already unrealistic portrait of a culture: after only seeing a few heavily edited bits and pieces we've assumed what's in the rest of the book.
After two months of living here I can say that everything you don't like about our culture is enthusiastically present in China. It's just as much a worry obsessed, consumer whore, shallow hateful culture as back home. There are good bits, of course--just as there's good and bad bits everywhere. My Shifu (ooo, dropping some mandarin spelling on y'all) even complains about how Chinese people don't take care of themselves as well as Westerners.
But let's take it one step further. After all, we're not necessarily talking about your average Chinese citizen. Well, the two Shaolin masters--as in grew up in the real Shaolin temple--I see everyday are, unsurprisingly, pretty human. They aren't stoic, infinitely wise men (it always seems to be men with this stereotype) who stroke beards and mostly grunt. One loves zombie movies, and my Shifu has fairly short temper.
So stop comparing cultures. The martial arts is a product of a certain worldview, yes. But that worldview is not an accurate picture of Oriental culture, both modern or ancient. Consider the rhetoric of medieval European chivalry compared to the brutal and often cruel practices of knighthood. So much smoke for the size of the fire.
At the same time, the martial arts has become a worldview of it's own. Embrace the humility, patience and accountability of our practice rather than a five point exploding palm or any other fantasy we like to tell each other. And don't project some imagined values on a different culture.
Monday, November 2, 2009
i are fifth
Some i ams to start the week
10. i am organized
"he'll be able to reach behind him and grab a tool without looking. move it two inches to the left and he'll spend weeks looking for it."
so says pirsig. so says a lie. enforcement by routine breeds only the hollow comfort of repetition and by forcing the disparate details of existence into a optimistic, arbitrary system do we reach behind ourselves to find everything in a place ascribed to it as opposed to where it actually is.
look back for once and you'll find the chaos of reality but as long as you keep your eyes forward on the system, the vapid optimism, the unreality you've chosen for your perception you'll stay happily sane and unquestioning: an orgy of order self-imposed that keeps us content and most importantly, quiet. This piece of plastic garbage goes there or maybe it should be moved two inches to the left because otherwise the whole place would fall apart and you, you the candide lacking even disaster, you'd have to look at things for what they are.
11. i am my business (i am my product)
i didn't know it was any of your business to be mine. i didn't know it was any of my business to give myself up to a brand. livelihoods are not conducive to living. real opinions aren't ok if i have something to sell. individuality unacceptable to the churnings of capitalism.
but i'll keep this all secret from myself because otherwise i wouldn't be able to wander through suburbia in eternal fear of doing anything out of the ordinary or even of real value because the soccer moms and dads are all peeking in terror through the curtains and my logo is scarred, branded, onto my forehead: uncle graham's family friendly beige coloured uncontroversial plastic wrapped generic martial arts fun club. won't change your life but we do birthday parties.
12. i am engaged (participative)
every moment is right here. all i do is breathe and see only what's in front of me. the only way i can recognize that i'm alive. a future means i'm blind and a past means i'm dead. only the next step is real and every punch is the last one i'll ever throw.
13. i am joyful
i've got a songbird drawn into my leg because i don't want meaning to sing and scream. i'll go onto rooftops to see the city as a collection of moments, clinging to the belief that nothing is worth more than my own worthiness, than my own sense of being. nothing matters more than right now, whatever it is.
at some point in space and time we'll press our foreheads together, surrounded by a city of garbage and the hopelessness we're told to have. i'll forget it all because for a second they'll be nothing beyond the smell of your hair and the flickering streetlight.
14. i am breathing
thinking about it, my existence suddenly becomes deliberate. staying alive no longer left to the medula oblongata--the piece of lizard still left in me, haphazardly flawlessly regulating the necessities. but i can take over that one piece, become simply the function, confront the details in order to see. in, out, in, out. inoutinoutinoutinoutinoutintoutinoutinout until never and forever.
i can't hold my heartbeat but i can clamp my mouth shut to keep the outside world and the gift of life at bay. i'll always open sooner rather than later because my medula and myself have interests in still being around. the joys of panic waver under the rush of inout.
10. i am organized
"he'll be able to reach behind him and grab a tool without looking. move it two inches to the left and he'll spend weeks looking for it."
so says pirsig. so says a lie. enforcement by routine breeds only the hollow comfort of repetition and by forcing the disparate details of existence into a optimistic, arbitrary system do we reach behind ourselves to find everything in a place ascribed to it as opposed to where it actually is.
look back for once and you'll find the chaos of reality but as long as you keep your eyes forward on the system, the vapid optimism, the unreality you've chosen for your perception you'll stay happily sane and unquestioning: an orgy of order self-imposed that keeps us content and most importantly, quiet. This piece of plastic garbage goes there or maybe it should be moved two inches to the left because otherwise the whole place would fall apart and you, you the candide lacking even disaster, you'd have to look at things for what they are.
11. i am my business (i am my product)
i didn't know it was any of your business to be mine. i didn't know it was any of my business to give myself up to a brand. livelihoods are not conducive to living. real opinions aren't ok if i have something to sell. individuality unacceptable to the churnings of capitalism.
but i'll keep this all secret from myself because otherwise i wouldn't be able to wander through suburbia in eternal fear of doing anything out of the ordinary or even of real value because the soccer moms and dads are all peeking in terror through the curtains and my logo is scarred, branded, onto my forehead: uncle graham's family friendly beige coloured uncontroversial plastic wrapped generic martial arts fun club. won't change your life but we do birthday parties.
12. i am engaged (participative)
every moment is right here. all i do is breathe and see only what's in front of me. the only way i can recognize that i'm alive. a future means i'm blind and a past means i'm dead. only the next step is real and every punch is the last one i'll ever throw.
13. i am joyful
i've got a songbird drawn into my leg because i don't want meaning to sing and scream. i'll go onto rooftops to see the city as a collection of moments, clinging to the belief that nothing is worth more than my own worthiness, than my own sense of being. nothing matters more than right now, whatever it is.
at some point in space and time we'll press our foreheads together, surrounded by a city of garbage and the hopelessness we're told to have. i'll forget it all because for a second they'll be nothing beyond the smell of your hair and the flickering streetlight.
14. i am breathing
thinking about it, my existence suddenly becomes deliberate. staying alive no longer left to the medula oblongata--the piece of lizard still left in me, haphazardly flawlessly regulating the necessities. but i can take over that one piece, become simply the function, confront the details in order to see. in, out, in, out. inoutinoutinoutinoutinoutintoutinoutinout until never and forever.
i can't hold my heartbeat but i can clamp my mouth shut to keep the outside world and the gift of life at bay. i'll always open sooner rather than later because my medula and myself have interests in still being around. the joys of panic waver under the rush of inout.
short and bitter
It started snowing today, big wet flakes that slowly drifted down and melted. A quick drop in temperature accompanied that-- thankfully, my room is warm.
Makes me miss home.
My sanda matchs on friday went pretty well. I dominated my second fight, though it wasn't all out. The first match was more serious. I managed to hold my ground and had some good shots, but a lot of my technique went out the window. That just means more opportunity to improve.
Being November, I've upped my pushups to 350 per day. I'm around 400 short of my schedule due to my injury last week, but I'll have caught up by this weekend. Here's the first of my monthly totals (well, most of this month--I didn't start counting until the 6th or so):
pushups this month: 5,600
pushups total: 5,600
pushups to go: 174,400
Makes me miss home.
My sanda matchs on friday went pretty well. I dominated my second fight, though it wasn't all out. The first match was more serious. I managed to hold my ground and had some good shots, but a lot of my technique went out the window. That just means more opportunity to improve.
Being November, I've upped my pushups to 350 per day. I'm around 400 short of my schedule due to my injury last week, but I'll have caught up by this weekend. Here's the first of my monthly totals (well, most of this month--I didn't start counting until the 6th or so):
pushups this month: 5,600
pushups total: 5,600
pushups to go: 174,400
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