The 3rd week has ended here at the retreat center. The days seem to go by so fast and the weekend it seems is over before we know it or get a chance to really enjoy it.
During the week it was training as usual. My knee is getting much better so I’m able to do more and more as the days go by. It’s amazing what Tai-Ji Quan, Qigong and just the hard physical training in general have done for my knee. A month ago my leg was weak and I was just off crutches and I could barely walk. Now I’m doing things I thought would take months to build up to. I’m now able to walk normally without pain or weakness in my knee, I can maintain low stances throughout training and I’m even beginning to train ma bu (horse stance) on bricks like the rest of the group. I play it safe and face the railing to Shifu’s house just in case I loose my balance I can quickly grab the railing and save myself. I’ve had to do this twice which is less often than I imagined it would be.
I contacted my physical therapist early this past week and he says that I might be able to begin jogging or running and even jumping by as early as next month. This is great news for me and very encouraging. My physical therapist is located in Orange County Southern California so I wont know for sure what all I can do until I drive down and see him again and he checks out my knee. His name is Amit Gandhi and he’s been an awesome therapist. I have a follow up appointment in about 3 weeks so until then I’ll just continue training as I have been.
From the beginning 3 weeks ago we’ve done cinder block training where we throw cinder blocks into the air and catch them with both hands. We do 60 straight catches of straight up and down tosses and also 15x’s where we flip them forwards and also 15x’s backwards and then catch them. In the beginning this was very difficult for all of us especially on our hands. My hands were so torn up and even bloody…they still are but they’re now developing calluses. Now after 3 weeks of doing theses exercises everyday I’m now able to flip the bricks from side to side and even flips, length side down using only one hand. For me this is training that I really enjoy. Because of cinder block training and staff conditioning all of our grip strength is consistently and noticeably improving.
Something interesting happened this week. Everyday after we come out of meditation we train various exercises. For instance we rub our hands together producing heat and place them over our face and inhale and exhale. We tap our head, massage our knees, slap and massage our feet, and do various stretches and related qigong exercises from the 8 Pieces of Brocade. Although we had been doing these exercises for the past 3 weeks I did them not understanding there purpose. And so I asked Shifu why we do these exercises. Instead of telling me straight up, he told me to ask my shungdi (brothers) why we do them and then prepare a lecture to explain them. Ok great I thought. What have I gotten myself into? So over the next few days I asked my shungdi one by one and although we all had vague ideas as to why these exercises were done, none of us were sure…our ideas were all guesses, none of us really knew. So the day came and I had to give my lecture. It was…interesting…at the very least an interesting and educational experience.
(Giving my lecture...I had fun)
When Shifu gives his lectures and seminars he is entertaining, funny and also clearly explains what he is teaching and when he does not know something or have a deep understanding he has no problem coming out and saying it. Well I tried to take a similar approach. I had a great time giving my lecture and I had everyone laughing even Shifu…but overall I made a lot of mistakes and because I didn’t know the material I was lecturing about, I totally lacked confidence in what I was saying. I used the word possibly in describing every exercise because my explanations were only possibilities of what they may have meant. Well I overdid it with the word possibly. I succeeded in being entertaining but totally bombed in every other area. Shifu pointed this out. All in all I had a great time but in the end I felt kinda bad because I knew I could have done better, especially if I had really known and understood the material. Well a lesson learned for next time. Balance the lecture with humor, entertainment, confidence and a seriousness that comes with understanding…Just like Shifu.
This weekend Shifu went to San Francisco to lecture at a Qigong conference. This morning we all got up at around 4-4:30am, piled into the suv and drove Shifu to the airport...I drove. Man was I tired! All the guys and our 2 guests Jennifer and Stephan (Both from Quebec) all slept on the way...actually I'm not sure if Jennifer slept, but everyone else did for sure. After we dropped Shifu off all of us except for Patrick (he was sleeping in the car) went to a restaurant to have breakfast. Then we went to the mall and Borders for a couple hours. From there we went to Shelter Cove, which is beautiful and totally amazing. We even saw seals playing around in the water. I heard that there were star fish in the water so I searched for them but didn't find any. I later found out the tide was too high and had we gotten there earlier in the day we would have seen them....that's ok though, another reason to go back.
(Patrick takes a picture of Jon, Mike and Me scaling some rocks)
Something really funny happend to Ricardo today...well at the time it probably wasn't funny to him but looking back it totally was. Jon tells the story on his blog so if you're interested check it out. To give a hint it involves seagulls. Ricardo is a good guy and a great sport.
(Shifu's 5 Animal Sports Qigong DVD)
