Who Am I Now?

This is probably my last post as part of the Snake Team and I can't help but be a little reflective. This I Ho Chaun year has changed me in so many ways. I didn't fully complete many of the requirements but I see the benefit of starting to encorporate each one into my life. This year faced me with pretty much all my weaknesses and it was a difficult journey but well worth taking. I didn't realize how much time I wasted doing nothing but wasting away until this year. My diet was pretty gross when I think back on what I ate and I never really had any sort of sense of accomplishment, this year has been a little different.


Each requirement helped me in different ways. Having personal goals is a sure way of making sure I couldn't procrastinate and gave me a good kick in the rear to not keep putting things off. The pushups and situps helped with disciplining myself. The acts of kindness really made me face reality of the choices I make everyday and how I am impacting people. The logging showed my progress. The blogging shared my journey with others who may be facing the same issues and may be uncomfortable talking about it, therefore just maybe inspiring someone, that they can do this too. It was also a way to reach out to others when I couldn't say things face to face. Performing in front of others helped me to start allowing my body to react and use its muscle memory without allowing my mind to interfere. (This one is still a major work in progress) The kilometers got me off my lazy butt. The forms reps gave me a better eye for detail and allowed me to start feeling how my body moves. And, well the weapons form was just fun. By not being able to quit, I failed and started over many times but still slowly learned not to give up. It's simply a process to start changing your life for the better and you don't actually fail unless you stop trying. It's interesting too how I started adding more and different goals as the year progressed as I saw more things in myself I wanted to change. I still watch movies and some shows on Netflix but am learning how to knit so I'm not just rotting on my couch while doing so. I also started treating myself to manicures and pedicures on payday, I would never, ever do that before, but why not be nice to myself once in awhile.


I really enjoyed the group this year, I don't think that I've ever been around such a good group of people. I've learned so much from each of you and thank everyone who helped me along the way. I love the energy around the kwoon and like being there. I'm trying to convince Josh to move back to Spruce Grove when he's done school.


If you're reading this and think you can't do it, you can. If I can, you can. I was 30 when I started kung fu. Being older and out of shape has it's challenges but it's better than spending the rest of my life accomplishing nothing in front of a television.

Jedi Mind Tricks?

Well, I'm frustrated. Still haven't found out what's wrong with me. I think the biggest problem is that my doctor went on vacation and I saw another doctor who sent me for another series of tests and I still don't have an answer. It's probably something stupid and they'll give me a pill for 5 days and everything will be better. It would be nice to know what's going on with my abdominal/kidney area though so I can be done with it. My hip and knee have been acting up again too, especially the knee. Josh looked at it yesterday and said it was really swollen. How that happened? No idea. I've been doing absolutely everything suggested to me. Bought a new bed, bought orthotics, saw a chiropractor...How much does one spend before it's enough? Needless to say, lately I'm pretty cranky. I've been researching lately how the mind works. I've always thought that training your brain into manifesting what it is you want in life is a bunch of malarkey and quite frankly super positive people annoy me. (I'm really not a terrible person) But I've come to the conclusion that I need to be more open minded and maybe, just maybe bringing more positivity in my life won't be such a bad thing, we'll see. OPEN MIND! I'm unsure of how I decided to do the horse team. I had changed my mind a few times and was going to back out. I even had a letter written to Sifu Brinker that I was going to give him telling him I changed my mind again and don't want to do the I Ho Chaun the day I decided instead to just pay for it and keep the letter to myself. I guess I realized that this is good for me and I like you people. Lots of thing did change for me this year, and I definitely recognize the difference in myself and I guess I'm starting to like me a little. I can't wait to be back to regular classes. I felt really out of place watching from the sidelines on Saturday. Thanks to those who took a minute to come talk to me, it made me not feel so left out. The dragon dance looks fantastic and the demo is awesome. One day I'll be brave enough...Positive thinking right? We'll see how that goes.

Changing Bad Habits

You'd think after a year of I Ho Chaun I'd have a disciplined scheduled down pat. Heck no, I'm always forgetting to do pushup and situps, I rarely remember to log things and I just can't seem to get it together. This year I'm going to work on consistency, smaller, more realistic goals that I can maintain for the whole year so I don't spike and drop so much in my training. Right now I'm working on associating breakfast and dinner with vitamins and pushups and situps. It seems to take forever to break a lifetime of bad habits. One day I'll get this if I just keep trying.

It's Been Awhile

Haven't been to class and practices lately. Sorry. Most of it is due to being sick and really icy roads by my place. Although that's the main reason, if I'm honest, It's not the whole reason I haven't been motivated to go to practices. I do not want to be in the demo. I sort of feel like the only way to get away from it is to not show up. I was reassured I won't be put on stage if I don't want to be, but even practicing now during open training with all these extra people around makes me want to just leave. It's nothing anyone did, and I know everyone is just trying to help me with this fear and I know that intentions are very good by not wanting to make me feel left out, it's a personal thing. It was a giant step for me to even do my form in front of the I Ho Chaun group, but I'm not ready for anything beyond that yet. Yes, I feel bad, but I can't help it. I also understand that a lot of you have anxiety and fears about doing your forms in front of people too, and I admire you for being able to conquer that but I just plain can't right now, I'm just too much of a chicken I guess.

New Years Resolutions

Happy New Years everyone! Josh asked me yesterday if I had any resolutions. I said no, I'm in the I Ho Chuan, that's a big resolution itself. I guess if anything my goal is to do better with the physical stuff than this year. I feel this year was terrible for things like pushups and situps. I've stopped and started so many times, I didn't progress at all. I'm kind of in a valley right now with training. I'm having a really hard time doing pushups and situps at all, even modified ones. I've gone as far as I can go with anything in regards to public performances and I haven't been making my classes. I wish I could say when I'm not in class I'm practicing at home, but I'm not. I need that motivation that I get from being in the kwoon. I really need to change that this time around, I just have to figure out a way that works for me. I think we just may have to move back to Spruce Grove when Josh is done school.

Random Thoughts From My Couch

Things I've changed this year; An oven can be used for cooking things. Who knew? I buy alot less microwaveable things. I listen to my body and find out what it needs instead of ignoring it. I don't shop when I'm in a hurry, it causes me to be rude to people. I don't give up when things get hard, I set my boundaries and work to push past them, setting the bar a bit higher as I progress. I'm not as nervous to speak up and try things. Things I need to work on; Creating smaller, more sustainable goals. Work past the nerves so I can do public performances. I know you are supposed to keep going when you mess up but I freeze completely. LOGGING - Total epic fail this year. Practicing at home, I have a hard time motivating myself to practice at home, I find a billion other things to do. Knowing that I'm like that, maybe I'll look into the YMCA down the street for next winter, that way when the roads are to icy for me to go to Stony, I can do a class there so I'm at least doing something. Things I said I'd do but I didn't; Go to San Sao. I really was going to start this class but it was getting too much to travel to Stony so many days a week. Blog when I missed class, I stopped doing this because I started missing alot of classes during the winter, always because of road conditions. Things I want to change with next years team; COMMUNICATION. I want to stress the importance of this. If you can't commit to something, don't. It drove me crazy this year to have to keep having to start over again with dragon dance basics because we kept having different people all the time. I also found it frustrating planning my schedule around practices and ending up not having enough people and finding out everyone went camping. Well, I could've gone camping too. This is the same with everything else, including the renovation projects, tiling, Pandamonium, etc. If you say you're going to be there, be there. By just not showing up, you leave all the work to everyone else. The hardest things I've done this year; Blogging, I'm a very private person. Asking for help, I never do that. Forms Seminar, Bootcamp, organized a demo, doing my form in front of the class, leading warmups, speaking up when I disagreed with things and failing and starting over many many times. Sorry for the long rambling blog post. If you are still reading this, you must be bored. :)

From Outside to Inside

Watching the Dragon Dance practice on video was a bit unreal to me. 3 or 4 years ago (can't remember when I started) I came to a Chinese New Years banquet with Josh. I was immediately mesmerized by the weapons demos and thought it was so cool. Not long after I was talking to Sifu Brinker, and signed up for kung fu. The past few years around this time, I'd sit in open training watching the lion dance practices and thinking how awesome it was and I wish I could do something like that, and now...here I am. I struggle quite a bit with a lot of this stuff. I was more of the artsy type rather than athletic growing up and suddenly my more active life style has made me extremely conscious of hurting myself and issues I'm having with my body that I probably should've resolved years ago. I wish I had done this a long time ago, instead of in my 30s, but someone once said "the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the second best time is now" So I guess I'm doing it now. I hope one day I become good with my ropedart and inspire someone else to try. My goal is to have a form that looks fluid and beautiful like some of the forms I've seen on the internet. I think the biggest compliment would be to have someone ask to help them learn.