Andy's Blog

With the myriad of complications that have been taking up my time this year, it is still surprising that “people” are the biggest complication of the lot.

I made a decision earlier this year.  A fairly radical decision tis true.  The decision was based on a very personal time of reflection, not lightly made, and one that was built upon some quite intense experiences this year.

Am slightly surprised therefore that someone has taken offence.

As my Sensei has said on numerous occassions; “karate is a journey, not a race”.  For some of us this journey takes a little longer than others, wrong turns have been made and our own personal SatNav needs a little tweaking to get us back on the road.

One person’s decision on their readiness for a new grade is not a reflection on another’s.  It is up to each of us, when the question is asked, to answer if we are prepared internally for that next step.  I’m not.

As I said in a previous post, which far better puts across my feelings, than this slightly rambling post;

“I need to stop chasing the next belt for the next few years and practise on becoming a black belt rather than just wearing one“

I made that decision for myself.  I ask that question of my students.  Each of us can only make that decision for ourselves individually and not for someone else…   and that has to be respected if nothing else.

“Ah“, said the screen, “I think you’re at the ‘Losing my religion’ phase…”

Which is a slightly strange thing to read, especially as I never had ‘religion’ in the first place.  There is a heart dropping moment when you feel that the next bit of advise to come your way is about how God will magically come along and fix things for you if only you believe hard enough, visit his house on a regular basis, put pennies in his coffers, read his biography, and mumble to yourself with your hands clapped reverently in front of you.

Well that did flit through my mind briefly and was then rudely drowned out by a mandolin that started playing in my head and the image of some bloke dancing like he’s had all the bones removed from his body.

Support forums are a strange land to inhabit.  Sitting in front the computer screen talking with someone you’ve never met about where to stick your personal “use by” tag and whether it really should be “best before” (split decision on this between being a physical or mental age requirement) or “display until” (we shan’t dwell on the conclusion as to when and where that sticker should be placed on your person). Continue reading

Sepai, or any kata for that matter, should always be done fully enveloped in a gi or at least with some form of top to go with the leg wear.  That rule, at least, should always apply to myself any-ways.

I’ve been lying back on my backside for way too long getting fatter and, somewhat alarmingly, hairier and it was time to get some practise in – especially after my recent revelation… and I’ve been thinking of timings, etc, to get my Sepai stronger and faster.

Find a room with some space in it and step back into sumo stance and bring the hands round in a nice strong arc, step forward and bring your hands together whilst drawing them in.  Step through and strike with your elbow whilst in sumo stance.  Step through again into an almost backwards long forward stance whilst striking a powerful pose…

…the powerful imagery of that pose, that is in your head at least, is finally broken when you notice the mirror to one side.  The pulling of the arms back is not making your pectoral muscles ripple, as you imagine it should be, but pulling up your flabby stomach and finally letting the belted area of your leg wear see the light of  day.

Worse still, when you bring your arms back and execute the outside shuto you notice that your flabby belly area is still wobbling from a move you completed two steps back in the kata.

I half heartedly did the mae-geri kick which only succeeded in making the devil’s own scrotum that is my footwear (flip-flops) sail out through the open door like an exocet missile.  I think the cat screeching in fright and sounds of a car crash was more my overactive imagination and a product of watching far too many cartoons than anything that actually happened.

Next time I do that kata I must remember; no flip-flops and definitely wear a gi…. oh, and no mirrors!

Yesterday, Sunday, was a mixed day for me, flicking between feeling sick to my stomach, angry at chances lost, quiet, melancholic, happy for others, and more darkly somewhat self-pitying.

…and I hate myself for that.

I’ve been reading Gichin Funakoshi’s books lately; namely ‘The essence of karate’ and ‘The twenty guiding principles of karate’ and have found myself wanting.  I think I’ve been so focused, recently, on the next grade that I’ve forgotten what it entails.

The colour of your belt is not a right based on how long you’ve been practising the art, but the culmination and growth of understanding of the principles underpinning it.  This has been proved by a colleague who has just reached that next level and his karate, which is far better than mine, proves the point.

Time is not the measure, understanding and application is.

I think it’s time to get back to basics for me.  This isn’t a throwing-dummies-out-the-proverbial-pram moment, the karate training will go on.  However I think I need to stop chasing the next belt for the next few years and practise on becoming a black belt rather than just wearing one.

Sometimes having the wind taken from your sails, metaphorically at least, is the best thing if not a little hard on you at the time…. time, at least, will tell if that’s true or not.

Sunday was very much a “Grand Ol’ Duke of York” day; When I was up, I was up.  When I was down, I was down.  Today I’m neither up nor down.  I was going to title this post “Four seasons in one day, part II” for pretty much the same reasons as the original post.  A rollercoaster of emotions varying from pain, joy, sadness and pride although not necessarily in that order.

The joy of seeing my fellow karate-ka progressing to their next level, especially all the new brown belts, was tinged slightly with the realisation that I wasn’t going to be able to make my own progression.

Despite eminently wise words from Sensei, and other friends, about priorities; one can’t but feel that the ‘ongoing buggerage’ has won this little round just before I deal with it ultimately.  As noted to my Sensei, “at least it gives me more time to practice my sanseru and sepai“.  Although truth be told my heart really wasn’t in it.

I think, if nothing else, the two weeks “off” I’ll be having will give me time to charge up the ol’ batteries.  I have already started to fill up my media player with an almost obscene amount of musical tracks and the kindle is starting to groan under the weight of books that have been loaded on there.

It’s also good to know that friends “have your back” and that if nothing else things will be ticking along whilst I’m not there.  The hugs have been rather lovely too :¬)

I won’t be online though.  Recently, and I mean very very recently, it’s almost been too hard to keep things in check; grading, as I said, was too much of a rollercoaster – and funnily enough I think Sensei was very much aware of that fact… as did my tough love guardian angel (as always)!

you can’t go on thinking nothing’s wrong
who’s gonna drive you home tonight?

The answer, as always, is ultimately “me”, but you can’t help but wonder somtimes…

I can’t exactly remember if this is something I started doing once I began my travels down the road of Karate’dom, or was as a consequence of my travels up the colour spectrum, however the desire to start practising strange moves in open spaces becomes sort of overwhelming.

It doesn’t even need to be that open a space; sumo stance whilst brushing your teeth, chudan/jodan tsuki combo’s against the inanimate bath gown hanging on the bathroom door, slow sidekicks against anything remotely upright and substantial, kata in the kitchen, and mae-geri front kicks….

Whilst awaiting the kettle to boil in the kitchen I decided my mae-geri front kicks needed a bit of work on them.  Face the wall, extend the leg to get the distance right so I don’t break the toes on the hard immovable object, I’m not *THAT* stupid, and practise a few snap kicks.

Foot on standing leg stays turned in slightly, raise the knee sharply on the kicking leg and snap a kick towards the wall and back to the starting position.  Repeat.

All was going well, some minor adjustments needed but none too shabby if I do say so myself  …and then the unconscious ‘good’ idea sprang into my mind whilst I wasn’t looking.

Snap kick decided, mid-way, to turn itself into thrust kick.  Foot on the standing leg turned from pointing slightly inwards to swivelling on the ball of the foot and thus giving me an extra few inches of kicking distance…. just enough to make toes and immovable object (wall) get intimate with each other.

‘Fortunately’ brain figured this out before the two could get carnal.  Unfortunately gravity and socks then took over.  Kicking foot sharply stopped and pulled itself back from the brink, standing foot continued its socked swivelling and then gave up its attachment to the laminated flooring.

There’s a strange point in this ballet of stupidity, when one see’s both of your own feet in front of your face, time stops and you think to yourself;

.oO( those shouldn’t be there! )

…and then time restarts.

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Leisurely looking up at the ceiling from the comfort of the horizontal and, whilst buttock cheeks complain loudly and persistently, contemplating the patterns and swirls of the rendering upon it, I couldn’t help but muse that this wasn’t exactly what Sensei had in mind when he said that karate shouldn’t be practised solely in the dojo.

The wise saying goes that karate isn’t a race, but a journey.  Unfortunately some of us have forgotten to switch on the sat-nav :¬\

A new month is upon us and.. oh my tis gonna be a full adventure packed one this year!  June, it has to be said, definitely had quite a few more downs than ups and really took a nose-dive as it approached its ultimate whimper.  The blog, as ever, suffered from a lack of updates but sometimes life is very rude in its attention grabbing; and these really weren’t things I could ignore.

So I start the new month off looking for some ‘new adventures’… let’s leave it at that for the moment, and contemplating a month of pain(s)…. of various unique flavours.

The little buggerage that is cancer is having the local quackery peek, poke and “hmmmm” at it first thing with a view to finally giving it its marching orders;  scalpel and eye-watering equipment at the ready!

Before one can even clench one’s but-tocks at that thought I shall be throwing myself, and number one sprog, into the competitive art of funny poses and grunting in a japanese accent.  I would call it Karate, but that really is doing the fair martial art a disservice… at least on my part.

What’s more worrying is that I shall be pitting my questionable skills against a large number of other practitioners, with some very VERY dark coloured belts, all in the name of becoming world champeeen!

Get that over and done with and I will age an extra year almost immediately… literally!  Nope, not in some abstract sense of the word, I will actually have aged another year.  That is if I haven’t already aged prematurely when number one sprog officially enters his teenagedom the week before.

There’s a bit more to tap out into this post, but I can’t seem to compose the correct combinations of letters and punctuation marks into something vaguely coherent.

Ah well, cometh the end of July and I’ll be pretty much offline for a few weeks; no on-line presence, no work, no karate, no updates, no cancerous lumps bumps ‘n other stuff? no idea… we’ll cross that bridge when we get there though.

First day of the month!

I am looking at a blank screen, an amusing cartoon picture of myself smiling like the idiot I am, Black Stone Cherry playing in the background, an overused backspace key whimpering on my keyboard and a headful of nothing which is successfully making an appearance on this blog.

This post started off life as some form of apology for the sometimes teasing, sometimes sarcastic comments I tend to come out with, morphed to an amusing story about double glazing salesmen, light-hearted texts and then double-backed to the perils of playing with words.  Somewhere in the middle of all of that it became a little darker and whinier…. and I now find myself gravitating that way again!

I really should stop trying to write a blog post when I really don’t know what I want to write and begin to just splurge on the page, the results are somewhat more navel gazing than I am comfortable with.

If I’m honest I think, deep down, I’m still a little scared about the whole Cancer thing even though I put the whole happy face on (as ugly an image as that is), and the upcoming visit to the quacks in July for the latest prognosis.  Also, this post has also got an awful lot of sentences beginning with “I”, which is both very lazy and a little “me me me”.

I’m (there I go again) also worrying about my next grading, whether my karate is sufficient for the task or whether I can actually *make* the next grading.  As I said “dark thoughts indeed” and not something I am overly comfortable with.

I think I need to change the track…. in all senses of the word.

Keeping your guard up is almost one of the first things you learn in karate.  I probably extend this further than was originally anticipated although the physical aspect of this seems to escape me as Sensei readjusts mine yet again…. and again.

Despite the very few, who however good your guard is just seem to poke, punch and jab at your vulnerable areas, the guard remains and protects.  Letting it drop shows how scared you really are, and that’s just not the done thing.. not that I ever admitted to being the smartest biscuit in the barrel.

.oO( I am not entirely sure what type of biscuit I would be if I had to choose one, but there is unanimous consensus that the Chocolate Hobnob is the undisputed king of biccies! )

I digress.

Advancing a stage seems to bring with it a host of new experiences, things to overcome and a whole world of unique pain.  Sitting down, standing up, lying down, strike a stance, perform a kata, slouch on the floor… all are accompanied by some part of your body wanting to gain your attention in as startling a way as possible.

…but the guard remains.

“When the tides of life turn against you and the current upsets your boat, don’t waste those tears on what might have been, just lie on your back and float.”
- Anon

It’s wet and muggy today, and the end to another long karate weekend.  Come a grading weekend I never seem to be out of the Gi much, what with karate on a Saturday morning and Grading on Sunday afternoon, there’s precious little for anything else apart from hitting the sack.

Celebrating an engagement, at least for a little while, was a nice exclamation point to the week and breather before the weekend in white pyjamas began …although once the crazy gang arrived it gave me the chance to slip away quietly.

Grading is a full on exercise and the mugginess just acts to put you under that extra bit of pressure; it’s hard to give 100% when the very air you breath seems to be be doing everything it can to not reach your lungs.

Unfortunately all this makes for a ‘flat’ kumite session, everyone’s just too shattered to put up much of a fight.. I even had to practically chase one potential red belt around the dojo to get him to spar me.  I’m really not that scary!

However what makes your day is seeing a little 6 year old girl giving it her all to achieve that next belt.  Despite the mugginess, despite always seeming to be the smallest in the room, despite the tears of frustration when she ‘perceives’ she can’t do quite what is asked of her,  and repeating this at least 5-6 times a week,  still doesn’t give up and puts everything she has to gain that next milestone…

Kinda makes you a little embarrassed at the navel gazing you let yourself indulge in every so often.  Thankfully nobody was looking too closely at me as she ran up to get her shiny new red built and certificate, I do have a reputation to maintain… or at least I like to think I have one.

Well done Georgie!