karate

Surprise!

The test was nothing like anticipated, and was actually kind of ridiculously easy for me, as it played well to my strengths. I believe several people struggled, but I had minimal struggle – I aimed for perfecting the movements, while, it seemed, most others aimed simply to be able to do the movements. It was a surprise and a bit of a relief, as well as a touch disappointing. I was looking forward to the hard kick test of which I had heard for years. But it wasn’t meant to be. The head guy decided, for some reason, to do it all differently this time.

Perhaps they will decide that it wasn’t hard enough for us, and so will do their own version of it on us in February… only time shall tell!! But that’s how it all went today – simple and easy.

And I trust that it was perfect that way. Thank you, God.

…..

Separately, have you ever had something happen, and felt a need to speak up about it, though felt embarrassed or ashamed to have to bring it up in the first place? Yeah… I have one of those things that I now want and need to address, and am also scared to address. But I have reached out to the appropriate person, and will have that conversation with her tomorrow, and ask for her guidance on how to proceed with the situation as a whole. Hopefully, it was all intended as harmless. However, I still need to speak up about it and communicate that it wasn’t acceptable. (Yikes, I know. Prayers for successful communication appreciated.)

God, guide me clearly, please, and give me the ease and purpose and words needed for this situation to sort out beautifully and with you newly at its heart. In your name, I pray. Help me, please. Amen.

Post-a-day 2022

Testing, testing

Another test tomorrow for karate. This one is the first official one for the black belt status, and it is the most elusive, I suppose I can say. All we know is that, “it is really hard,” it is a kicking test, and it includes holding up the leg for a long time. Beyond that, we haven’t a clue. People keep asking me if I’m ready for it. Heck if I know! I’ll find out Saturday morning, though!

I did speak to the man giving the test, though, and he said not to be worried. So, I choose to believe him and to trust my physical fitness level. Just need to roll out my legs and warm them up on the morning, I think, and I should be good to do my best.

Deer God, please, help me to perform my best tomorrow. Help me to show that I am both capable and worthy of this goal. Help me to be a force for good, and to inspire good in others. Please, accept my boldness in asking for these things. Please, heal my man and me, that we be our best selves through you. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Post-a-day 2022

Ouch, but yay!

Well, I still feel a bit like I have the incomings of a cold, and my muscles are still achey all over, but we got our shopping all handled this afternoon and I passed my test with flying colors this morning. We started at eight and finished almost exactly at noon. Some stuff was a touch harder than I’d anticipated, just for my tiredness and soreness here and there differently so than usual, and other things went much more smoothly than I’d anticipated. For my katas, our instructed regularly shared how she “doesn’t give twenties” on the scoring of them (points are between five, ten, fifteen, and twenty, and she always writes in an eighteen of you do a really good job, which I usually do for my katas). And yet, somehow, today, I got not one but three twenties out of my six katas (the other three were 18s, as usual, of course). Now that was cool and unexpected. Thank you, God, for my effective performance there this morning.

Post-a-day 2022

Soup

I made a paleo/Whole30 chilli on Sunday evening, and then ate it yesterday and today. (I froze the majority of it, as my man is still on his juice cleanse he wanted, and he even stops day away from me, so he could have two three-day cleanses, instead of one five-day. [Recall that he wanted carbs for the 10k Sunday morning, so we ate food Saturday night and on Sunday, then he resumed the juice cleanse Monday.]) And, golly, is it good! I had never made chilli before, and was totally nervous I would make a pot of mediocre soupy stuff that I can’t stand for more than a few bites. Instead, I ended up with a vat of one of the best chillis I’ve ever had. Gratitude, God! Yay! Thank you, Heavems, for giving me a good recipe and for helping me actually do well in a super complex recipe. The more steps and ingredients they have, usually, the more likely I am to make it turn meh. So, this was a wonderful surprise.

The not-wonderful surprise was the massive trail of ants that attacked the cornbread when I’d left it (covered) on the counter yesterday for a couple hours. It was kind of terrible. Plus, we lost the cornbread… and I only get Jiffy cornbread when we want that down-home southern feeling, which we did for this meal. With its being so cold and wintery right now, that was exactly the feeling we’d wanted. And I’d left out the cornbread so that I could pack it up and freeze it after I’d had lunch. So much for that idea… Anyway, the chilli is now frozen and waiting patiently for my man, and that’s a positive.

Oh, and I’ve had soup yesterday and today both. I think I’ve been fighting off a virus or cold, as I’ve been absolutely exhausted – couldn’t even do almost anything Monday. This evening, I started getting a headache after I’d napped, and then started getting progressively colder at karate class. I ended up going home after we realized that everyone else found it on the warmer side there, and they were actually sweating. Likely that I was building a bit of a fever there. They told me to go home and eat some soup. Little did they know that I’ve basically been doing that the past two days already. 😛

Nonetheless, I need to be ready for the cold, outdoor test Saturday morning, so I need to heal up and eat well (in addition to preparing for the actual test, which includes performing a weapon kata that I haven’t quite yet created…). At that, I bid you a good and blessed and rest-filled night!

Post-a-day 2022

Big sigh

Have you ever done something when you’re having loads of free time, and totally loved it, but then, tried it again, but without the free time, and been none-too-excited about it?

We just started up karate classes again after a month break. I have since started school, right? Now, more than ever, I am exhausted in the late evenings, getting into bed as early as possible, sometimes even at 6:40pm. Yet karate class is assisting the juniors at 6pm, and attending my own class at 7pm. If I attend the other classes throughout the week, they go even later. But I need loads of hours to move forward in my official training and belt levels (which I want to do).

So, I guess I need to sit down in the next few days, and figure out how many hours of what I need, and how quickly (or slowly) I can and want to make them all happen. Otherwise, without the specifics and the goals set up, I might get a little too tired to do any of it, especially with school happening right now. I do love this all. But I need to be rested enough to be able to enjoy it fully. Otherwise, the teacher and German within me will tear apart the instructors and assistants and other adults mentally, and be annoyed throughout all the classes for a plethora of reasons. I really don’t want to be that way. Alas, I shall make my plan and get some sleep!

Because I want to beast at karate. Seriously.

Post-a-day 2021

Moving on up

I guess you could say my credits finally transferred fully today. You see, I started out in the adult division this sprint as a yellow belt, not white. But I hadn’t done any adult division before this year – only junior division. But I had gotten to the top belt level in the junior division, red belt.

Nowadays, they offer a dual credit, where junior students who are close to the age limit for juniors can take the tests for the adult belts, alongside their junior belt tests. That way, when they reach the adult age group, they don’t have to begin again at white, but just can continue. That was not a thing when I was a kid, however.

Nonetheless, the instructor started me off with the second belt level, yellow. I did all the classes (and then some) and participated in and helped with the tournament, and then took the belt test and moved up a level, to orange.

But then, the instructor asked if I would be comfortable, if given approval by the head of the whole organization, moving up a few belt levels at the upcoming belt test. I was, and I told her so.

A few days later, she told me that I not only would be able to move over a few levels, but that I would be passing through another three levels (four total), and would be testing to receive my brown belt (the one just below black).

I was excited, but knew a lot of work would be needed in order to pass the test – I definitely did not know the katas.

However, these past several days, I have learned them.

Tonight, I performed them, as well as the original kata I created this morning while on a break at school.

And no onlookers would have known that I learned them all in under a week, with only a total of about two hours of practice.

All in all, I did an excellent job on the test as a whole, which is exactly what I had wanted to do. Still room for improvement on site-ups speed and katas. All the test, however, is golden.

And I am officially a brown belt in American Karate now, which is very, very cool.

Post-a-day 2021

Saturday night

I didn’t go right to sleep when I got home. I stressed a little, ate sufficient food, tidied a little further, then chatted for over three hours with a friend on the phone. At one point, she asked me how karate was going, and I ended up pulling myself off the floor and pulling out the videos of the katas I have to do this coming Monday. I mostly knew the steps of one, and the beginning of the other, from watching the videos and stepping through Thursday night after testing in class for the other stuff. Today and this week have been so exhausting, though, I had already forgotten about needing to learn the katas this weekend. But I got up and got to work.

She stayed with me on the phone as I did it, and she even commented that she felt like she understood exactly what I was doing, just by listening to me. Hearing me work through out loud each part and combination and re-doing and adding and remembering and learning and breathing and exclaiming thoughts, she was right there with me in my mind as I figured it all out and worked through everything. Sure, she knows next to nothing about karate. But she knows dance and she knows choreography, so she understands the process. I think it was actually a lot of unexpected fun for the both of us.

Anyway, I think I know the two katas now. I just have to focus tomorrow on the details of the various steps and movements, and then go through for nit-picking improvements with the instructor before actually performing them Monday evening.

And, of course, I have to make up my own and perform that, too…

On that note, though I stayed up way late doing all of that, I shall sleep now. I have much to do tomorrow, aside from all of this, already.

Post-a-day 2021

Going brown

Tonight was the first half of my brown belt test for American Karate.

I did, really, quite well. I hit well over the maximums on everything except sit-ups – because 76 sit-ups in two minutes, keeping the hands on the head is not easy, so I only got 60. We only needed 40 push-ups for maximums points. I got 62, and all with quite good form and pacing. We needed over 100 kicks in each category for max points… I had 118 as my lowest count. On some exercises, I even surpassed the kid who has been actively training for this for years. That was very surprising for me. And I surpassed my own scores in everything, from the time I had done a run-through of the test just for fun, months ago. I had no knowledge of my being in a path to take the test a year and a half sooner than expected. Not until three weeks ago, anyway.

I still need to learn the katas. I only was just exposed to two of them last week for the first time, though, I know the third one already. Then I also have to make my own kata, and perform it. I’m confident that that one will be rather easy for me, actually. So, I need to learn the two katas, really.

Otherwise, I will do everything else required for the test this coming Thursday night at class: running and a boatload of techniques. Then, we’ll practice the katas after that, and I’ll perform the katas, probably, one day next week.

Looking forward with gratitude to it all! Thank you, God and the Universe. I am grateful and delighted, and I am just the right kind of nervous. 😉

Post-a-day 2021

In the tournament today, my age and belt level had only three women, so, the black belts set us up to spar one another, with one girl having a sort of bye. So, I was put against the one girl who had shown up specifically because her instructor wanted her to spar me. The winner of our match was to spar the other girl next.

I was that person.

I won that match, too.

It was very cool.

However, the videographer for my matches totally blew it with the videos. He shook the camera terribly at all the important moments, without clear reason. So, the videos are near-useless for evaluating how I did from an outside perspective. (And he was the same one who did an amazing job last time on the video’s angle and stability! We will be discussing this, he and I. 😛 )

Nonetheless, I felt comfortable regarding the matches today. Though the advice is to jump into it as soon as the head judge says to go, throwing a kick or strike before the opponent has a chance to move or think, I didn’t really like doing that last tournament. It actually was much more stressful for me, and I was near-panicked at the risk involved.

I had seen how the upper belts, black especially, had tended to take their time in attacking one another. It was easy and casual to watch, though still exciting and filled with bated breath when they sparred. The action moments were frequent and awesome, but no one was in a hurry to dive into them as soon as the head judge said to go.

I was amazed by this. I immediately wondered at why I hadn’t done it myself. Then I remembered that the fast-hitting people always beat me in tournaments as a kid. So, I had taken a page out of their books. Those books apparently come from many instructors in the organization. However, not everyone does as he says. And, besides, that approach just isn’t my style.

In sparring in class this session, I took on seeing how it felt to be chill in my own skin in the ring, fully comfortable in patience and intention. When the head judge said to go, I prepared myself fully to receive an attack, but usually never had one. In those first moments, I learned much about the opponent in front of me, and I used it to my advantage. I watched how the person moved, reacted to blocks, dropped guards for certain movements. I didn’t wait long, but long enough to have an idea to use. And then I used that idea. And I usually destroyed.

Today was just the same. I watched my opponents in the eyes. I saw where they looked on my body, while keeping an eye on the tension changes in their own bodies. There was always a bit of a rise and a clench just before a move was made… and the eyes told me exactly where she had set her target. It was a mostly easy block, followed by a bit if pummeling from me. That is, of course, when I hadn’t already attacked her. Because, as a friend said upon seeing the videos this evening, I was on the offense (though the videos were messy, they were still clear enough to notice). Though I waited those precious moments at the beginning, or throughout as I planned my next moves and sought my own opportunities for points, I was still the one managing the ring.

And that was, surprisingly, not a surprising feeling for me. Frankly, it felt natural, as though it were where and how I always belonged: being in charge, running the show.

It was really, really cool.

I still have much, much room for improvement, of course, but attitude is everything in things like this, and my mind seems to have found its place beautifully.

Thank you, God and Universe. I a extremely grateful for all that was today. Happy Christmas in July and Kakigoori Day and, now, Titanic Day!!

Post-a-day 2021

Comfort

In karate tonight, there was a real adult-only class that followed the mixed (Aka kids) class. We began sparring for the session. As usual, I was extremely nervous. Even as I was, in a way, destroying my opponents in matches, I was dealing with those nerves, with that fear, allowing and releasing that sense of panic that always comes up for me around sparring.

The instructor even commented on how I had been so worried before, and yet see how far I had come… I told her that just because no one else noticed didn’t mean I had no fear or stress around the sparring…, as is the case with most anything in life. Just because we can’t see something on the outside, doesn’t mean it isn’t there on the inside for someone. As we put on our gear to spar, I had noticed the distinct reeling of my heart, panicked at what was potentially to come.

And, tonight, one of those things did come. The assistant instructor hit me hard in the center of the face. Though we wear helmets, his glove and hand hit the face cage so hard, it rattled everything, and it knocked me back a couple paces. No, my head didn’t jolt backward – I keep myself braced enough to avoid that -, but it shook me. And it frightened me. Just the sound from a hard hit on the helmet, from the inside, is jarring. The physical sensation addition of the hit itself just adds to the whole experience. When it happened tonight, I had to wait a few moments before I could return to the ring to continue. I was a tad dizzy, but only from the shock, not from any physical damage. I communicated that it had been too hard (he asked immediately, likely knowing, and I confirmed), and that I needed just a few moments to gather myself before continuing. And they allowed it easily. And everything was okay. I had I remind myself that I was safe and that everything was okay, including that I’d been hit so, and I put myself back in the ring before I fully felt like I wanted to be there. I knew I wouldn’t want to go back ever, if I didn’t just breathe and go back then. So, I went back in. I was nervous, and focusing on calming myself more than on sparring to win. I don’t remember the outcome of that match in particular, but I do remember that achieving the calm I sought was the best thing I could have done for myself. And I am grateful to have reached it, and to have been able not only t continue with other matches, but to do them calmly and stellarly. At the end of the night, I was clear that I had had a wonderful, fun, and free-feeling time… sparring. Which is awesome. 🙂

Post-a-day 2021