Mindfully Busy

Just a quick note to let you know that I'm alive and still living the kung fu life style.  Diet is going well, but I've been extremely tired during the workouts.  Working 4 jobs keeps me busy, busy, busy.  But this is temporary.  I could use more kung fu sleep, that's for sure.

I did get around to doing my latest challenge update:

Round 1 - February

35 solid straight punches to ping-pong ball in a row
first wake forward bend  - fingertips just above ankles
jumping - 1-inch below wrist above volleyball net

Round 2 - March
150 solid straight punches to ping-pong ball in a row
first wake forward bend - fingertips reaching tops of feet
jumping - 2.5 inches below wrist above volleyball net

Round 3 - April
209 solid straight punches to ping-pong ball in a row
first wake forward bend - first knuckle reaching tops of feet
jumping - 3 inches below wrist above volleyball net

Will catch up soon!

Attack of the blah, blah, blahs

Day 68 of the program and yes, I'm being attacked by the blah, blah, blahs!  Patrick's email couldn't have come in a more timely manner.  I do find myself getting occasionally bored with the exercises.  I don't necessarily smile when the feeling of blah comes about into my workout practice but I do just trudge forward and keep moving through the workout and eventually, I'm not as bored because I start to feel invigorated.  Working out everyday is something I know is important for me.  I know that if I don't make time for it, I don't feel as good body-wise.  Even on days where my body just doesn't want to move a certain way, just attempting or doing a little bit of exercise goes a long way.  Keeps me fighting off the blah, blah, blahs!

A few years ago, I had a workout buddy.  She was a former college track star, I was a former college volleyball star.  We were a good pairing because we complimented each other.  She pushed me on the running side of things, particularly when we had track workout days and I pushed her on the weight lifting and technique side of things.  At the time, I did not like running.  It was hard work, took too long and I was impatient. Once piece of advice she gave me for running on days when it just wasn't easy mentally or physically, was to run a 1/2  mile warm-up and see how your body feels.  If your body is absolutely saying no, then stop and move onto a different cardio activity.  If however your body starts to feel better after the 1/2 mile warm-up, continue on.  This piece of advice has helped me become a much better runner.  Learning to withstand the uncomfortableness during that first 1/2 mile warm-up, has helped me complete more running workouts.

This Saturday I will be running in a local Mud Dog race.  It's a 5K obstacle course run with you guessed it - MUD obstacles.  I hope the weather is warm.  It can be cloudy or rainy, just please let it be warm!  Hopefully I'll remember to take a picture and share the experience in a future blog.

Patience is back, now I just need to Focus!

First, I am so thankful to have "dinner" back in my life.  Hooray for new diets!

Everyday I get up and I look forward to the workout.  The legs swings for time make the reps fly by.  I'm getting much better at the resting buddha hold.  The leg that I hold up is so close to being parallel to the floor.  The Kung Fu sit-ups are still super tough.  I will keep working on them though.  It's just hard to hold myself up there and to not be effected by the slight swaying.   I usually finish out my reps on the roman chair, when I eventually cave to the Kung Fu sit-ups...oh you sinister activity!

My patience is back and I think it is directly connected to my stress level.   The stress level has gone down, things are getting to where they need to be and I'm making better choices in my daily activities to reduce the stress.

This past weekend was full of exciting stuff.  Played in a very special volleyball tournament which was celebrating 100 years of occurrence, the Pop Idell.  It is the oldest running volleyball tournament in the United States, possibly in the world!  Anyhow, my team took 3rd and afterwards I celebrated with my mindful consumption of 2 slices of veggie pizza and a salad.  This mindful consumption went much better, but at the same time, was it really a mindful consumption??  The next morning I woke up and felt great.  I was full of energy as I ran my personal volleyball training session, did my workout and then celebrated the afternoon by shopping for a new wardrobe.  I was down to only 2 pairs of pants that fit well for work so it was time.

I think it caught up with me though...the dreaded cookie cravings.  I had 5 oreos last night.  And they weren't even mine, they were my roommates.  But even after I ate all my nutrition plan foods for the day, I was still ravenous.  At a moment of weakness, I caved and had 3 Oreos and then decided I needed 2 more shortly after.  Ugh.  Oh well, moving on from my weak point.  This morning I awoke and jumped rope for 20 solid minutes, mostly to make up for my moment of weakness.  And I'm back on track!

The Wu-wei Patrick has been addressing is quite interesting.  I have noticed that there are a lot of times I feel off balance on my leg swings, kicks and agility section.  I think it's just a matter of focusing and slowing things down when I can.

Also doing the double punch in 10 seconds or less, well I'm glad I didn't have a mirror, cause I felt like I looked silly moving so fast.  But I was tired after those!

Day such and such

I've been pretty much coasting along and living a nice Kung-Fuey style life.  I'm finding the workouts invigorating and the meditation is much better now that I use a cushion.  The stretching portion of the workout is a nice precursor to the meditation.  Stretching calms my mind and makes me more aware of where my body is.  Listening to it's aches and pains, listening to what is feeling really good and what I may need to pay more mind to.  It's nice just getting to be fully aware of my body, connecting my mind and my body.

No troubles food wise other than it's too much food!  Maybe I'm just over-doing the AMAYW vegetable portions.  But I've had to pass on the yogurt evening snack for 2 nights now because I've been too full of veggies!

I'm still a bit stressed in life.  Work is spiraling sideways, front-ways and back-ways.  Coaching is going to pick up double time in April with the college season starting.  I'm in the process of buying my first home, so any free chance I get I'm just trying to really establish a mindful budget, going through old papers and receipts.  Spring cleaning of clutter!!  Cooking and prepping is just a way of life for me now.  Man it used to be so difficult, but 7 months later (including my PCP time) I'm a pro. 

Somehow, I need to make time for myself.  To just chill.  I think I have an open weekend in June for that.  We'll see.  Now to catch up on my fellow KFB blogs!

Kung Fu - Half-way thoughts

The time seems to be flying by.  I can't believe it's halfway thru KFB.  I remember halfway thru PCP and I felt like I was in a pit of despair.  So miserable, trudging thru workouts and chowing down food in such agony.  But with KFB, it's halfway and I find myself looking forward to the workouts.  I find myself looking forward to eating the good, medicine everyday.  Plus I'm way excited to have more amounts of food in my diet this week!  Hunger pangs are gone!

On the otherhand, mindful consumption #2 did not bode well for me.  I had the same thing as mindful consumption #1, a chicken and cheese burrito with a side of steamed broccoli and a dollop of guacamole.  Just like the first time, I picked around the tortilla to get to the cheesy-chicken goodness.  But this time, it didn't taste as good.  This time it wasn't as satisfying and I felt ubber full, ubber fast.  Disappointment and staying awake for most of the night is what happened next.  I felt ubber full for the entire night as the food just sat in my stomach.  I felt heart burn, indigestion and mega-bloating.

The next morning, despite my tiredness and overall cruddy feeling, I went for a run.  I ran for 40 minutes, hoping to help my system get the food from my mindful consumption out, it did help but the cruddy feeling remained for the rest of the day.  Tried to stay active all day long and also drank tons of water.  But I knew my Saturday of feeling good was not going to happen due to the food choices I made yesterday.

I was able to sleep on Saturday night and so I woke up feeling pretty refreshed Sunday.  Got my workout in, got my breakfast in, went to train volleyball for an hour and then just walked around the city because it was a beautiful day.  Sunday was a better day - body feeling wise and I felt thankful to feel good again.

In conclusion, 24 hours of crappy feeling is not worth the consumption of such food.  Next mindful consumtion I will need to do better and I will.

Challenge Update

Round 1 - February

35 solid straight punches to ping-pong ball in a row
first wake forward bend  - fingertips just above ankles
jumping - 1-inch below wrist above volleyball net

Round 2 - March
150 solid straight punches to ping-pong ball in a row
first wake forward bend - fingertips reaching tops of feet
jumping - 2.5 inches below wrist above volleyball net

The stats don't lie, KFB although a test of my patience has taken my volleyball game to another level.  I am forever thankful for that as I train up for the 4-day tournament in Dallas, Texas this year over the Memorial Day Weekend.

I still need to work in the bean count challenge. 

Staying kung fuey and looking forward to a mindful consumption - veggie pasta watch out!!

Rejuvenated!

So I'm really liking this week's workouts, I especially enjoy the freestyle agility sections.  They are a lot of fun and going for time makes it seem not as mundane.

I'm getting hungry again at nights.  I think my body could use some sort of whole wheat pasta dish in the evening as medicine.  I'm just saying...I'm HUNGRY!!! at times...

Besides the hunger, I've been reflecting on the events that happened and are continuing to unfold in Japan. Sending some light your way!

Test of Patience

I'm finding the workouts to be much longer.  Especially when it comes to the agility section of punching and kicking to a target.  Anyone else experiencing this?

The brown M&M

So I'm back from my trip to cold, cold Michigan.  The Saturday volleyball tournament was a great success, we lost in the finals to a more consistent team but it was a very competitive match.  I was tired in the semi-finals and finals, but I found a way to pull thru.  We started playing at 10:30AM and kept going until 9:00PM.  So a very good day, I worked in my wide angle forward bend at the end of the day and that was that. 

I find that I am definitely focusing on a straight back during the wide angle forward bend.  I know I will get better at it.  Just gotta be patient.

The after party of the Michigan tournament was not for me.  I did have one glass of wine, but after that I didn't have much to say.  I had caught up with most of my old Michigan friends during the tournament.  So when I got to the dark dance bar, it was just about as fun as a brown M&M.  I said hi to a few of the friends again, but then it was loud and dancey and I just wasn't feeling it.  I remember peering over at an old friend and saw her drinking beer straight from the pitcher.  All sweaty from dancing, in tight fitting clothes, eyes half glazed over as she chugged from the gigantic plastic pitcher.  It was at that moment, a cold wet substance hit my right shoulder and dripped down my sleeve.  Yep, you guessed it, beer was spilled on me and that was my cue to say goodnight. 

As for the mindful consumption, I went for mexican food.  I had a chicken and cheese burrito with a dollop of sour cream.  Oh so good.  I found myself picking around the tortilla and just getting to the good stuff: the chicken and cheese.  I still miss butter, salt and cream, but I know I feel better if I limit my consumption of them.

So I returned home safely Sunday evening and relaxed.  Little did I know that Monday was going to hit with a vengeance!

Monday morning started off fine, got up, went to the gym to do my workout and drop my car off for a routine oil change.  Multitasking from the get go.  Well after my workout, the oil change place said my tires were legally bald and my keys were stuck in the ignition.  I kind of had been putting off the new tires, so I decided to just get 'em and be done.  As for the key thing, it's happened once before but basically I was able to fix it just by quickly jamming the shifter forward, but even that wouldn't work this time.  So after finishing up at the oil change shop, I had a new problem of keys stuck in my car.  I was stressing, I hadn't eaten yet and it was going on 11:30AM.  Needless to say, I didn't make it into work Monday.  When I did finally get a chance to eat something, it was hard to eat because of me worrying about how much this was going to cost me.  Luckily, my roommate, hooked me up with a mechanic who although couldn't help me right away, by Tuesday, he had it repaired. 

So $1200 unexpected dollars later, everything is normal.  And life can get back on track.  It's funny how much I depend on my car and how I take it for granted.  It definitely has a lot to do with the stability in my life.

A Good Few Days

The past few days have gone really well.  I'm enjoying the workouts and the added strap enhanced stretches.  The kung fu sit-ups are still way tough, but at least this time around (first time was through PCP) I can actually do a couple in a row at a time with minimal swinging.  Neat!  Although it feels like I've gotten a tetanus shot in both arms, cause they are both oddly sore.  Maybe it's from the weighted blocks or the double punches.  I don't know, either way, I've had a few days in a row of feeling good and it is pretty awesome to acknowledge that.

The diet is going pretty well.  I decided against going to a birthday lunch because I was really worried about sticking to the nutrition plan.  They were going for Pho and well, I just knew I would have trouble ordering anything but Pho, so I didn't go.

This weekend will be a test diet wise as well.  My women's volleyball team is traveling back to Michigan (my home state) to compete in an annual volleyball tournament.  I am excited for the exclusive all women's trip and for the volleyball.  I am excited to see old friends and have them see the"new" me.  I am not too excited about the hanging out after-party that this tournament always hosts.  And gives free pitchers of beer to all tournament participants.  I know I can make good choices, they will be available, but the question is will I?

Tara mentioned in one of her recent blogs about how we are eating as medicine, to help repair and refresh our body.  A different mind-set of eating, rather than eating for pleasure or a way of coping.  I am very thankful to be doing KFB now as it is renewing my focus on eating.  Reiterating the fact that when I eat well, I feel better physically and mentally.  I hope I make good choices in Michigan.  I know I can, I just worry I won't because I'll be living in the moment.  Suppose I shouldn't worry about it, but it's hard not too.  Yeah, that has been the chatter in my head during meditation.

And with that I leave you with an iconic vision of my home town in Michigan.  Have a Kung Fu Weekend!

Joe Louis Fist

 

Fascinating

And so the dreaded apple, banana, egg white, milk dinners begin.  Well I did once dread them, but this time around it's different.  I'm ready, I actually look forward to the minimal effort on these dinners.  I just hope they give me enough energy come morning time to get my workout in.

This past weekend was interesting.  Fit in week 4's first workout on Saturday after a bikram yoga session.  I found I was a bit tired but I made it through the entire workout.  The elbow blows felt a bit different, meaning I didn't know if I was doing them right.  And the jumping side kicks, they are getting better.  I still need to work on landing with control, transitioning back to kung fu stance between kicks and figuring out where my hands and arms should be throughout the entire movement.  I feel that changes randomly depending on the what kind of control I have before, during and after the kick.

Early Sunday morning I woke up and felt pressure in my lower lip.  I went to the bathroom and turned on the light and was like, "WHOA!" (ala from the movie Hitch). My lower lip looked like a botched lip enhancement; like someone injected triple the amount of collagen into just that lip.  It was obvious I was having an allergic reaction to something, but I felt fine everywhere else and could breathe.  Nonetheless, I drove myself to the ER at 3:30AM to get treated cause I never had this happen before.  Turns out it was not a fast night at the ER, as they got really busy and since I wasn't life threatening, I was moved to low priority.  Well I waited and waited and finally my nurse got me a shot of benadryl and administered some other antihistamines at 5:30AM.  I waited some more because I just wanted to chat with a doctor and get properly discharged.  I finally saw a P.A. at 7:15AM.  He said that it was quite a peculiar allergic reaction, to have the swelling so localized.  But he also said it should go away in 1-2 days with antihistamine treatment and after whatever it was gets out of your system.  I have a feeling I know what it was, I tried some new freeze-dried asian pears and well, now I know, those are not for me.  That wait time was ridiculous, but at least I had a bed and could take quick naps in between the nurse performing routine diagnostics.  When I was finally discharged, the swelling had gone done a tad but my lower lip was still pretty inflated.  I felt like the guy from Kung Fu Hustle when he was stung by a lot of bees/wasps and as he was recovering from those stings, his lips were just hanging there swollen and not under his control.

For the rest of Sunday 9AM-4PM, I played in a volleyball tournament.  So having my sleep interrupted was not ideal, but I was only a bit tired throughout the day. I ended up having a pretty OK day of play though.  My volleyball game is improving beyond my PCP and KFB expectations.  I was able to get to a lot more balls than I could before PCP/KFB.  I felt more explosive and quick out of my defensive position.  I was also complimented on my play by several peers.  Yes, I'm well on my way to being at my best volleyball ability ever thanks to PCP and KFB.  And playing with a swollen lower lip didn't hinder me at all.

I am fascinated by the little improvements I notice everyday. <3 KFB.

Return of the Cookie Dreams

So during the first 30 days of my PCP experience, I started having very realistic dreams about cookies.  The dreams would start out normal and then somehow a cookie would come into the picture and the dream exploded into anything and everything about cookies.  There were even times where I felt like I cheated on the PCP nutrition plan because the dreams were so realistic.  I swear one morning I woke up and I could still smell the chocolate chip cookie smell lingering in my apartment from my dream!  Some kind of subconscious I have, eh?  Nonetheless I blogged about it, my team decided it was a very appropriate team name and thus the creation of Team Cookie Monster!

Well last night, I had my first cookie dream on KFB.  The nights without carbs are starting to rev up my cookie craving subconscious and last night I guess it couldn't stay hidden anymore.  It was a dream where I was reaching into a cookie jar and I would say "just one more" after ever indulging bite.  I kept repeating that philosophy until all the cookies were gone in the jar.  I woke up this morning and I felt like I seriously cheated.  Cheated on my KFB nutrition plan.  Ugh!  And so the anxiety of cookies begins for me.

Balance...wobble, wobble

Just got done with today's workout.  Resting Buddha proved a bit difficult.  I didn't really get my leg parallel to the floor and I kept falling out of the balance every 3-5 seconds.  I did find the jumping straight kicks to feel a bit more coordinated, so that was good. 

I should really drink more straight up water today but coffee and tea is what I'm craving.

Burning the daylight

It's been a while since my last post, but I've been continuing on the kung fuey way.  The past six days have been filled with my life and many career hats I wear.  This weekend was President's Day so I had a three day weekend away from my full time job and all that time was promptly filled with coaching and recruiting for volleyball.  I spent the long weekend in Washington, D.C. where there was an annual 3-day volleyball tournament for 12 year olds to 18 year olds.  Over 600 teams come from all over the nation and even some international teams make the trip.  I coach a 12 and under team.  Something about that age that's full of such raw, wonderful, contagious energy and enthusiasm.  

Food-wise went pretty well.  Stayed on kung fu plan for most of the meals.  Made on exception for Thai food, but even that, they offered some amazing brown rice for my carb.  It was much different then I ever had, almost an earthy texture and flavor.  No added salt or butter, just the brown rice grain.  I hope I get an opportunity to eat there again. 

I missed one workout just for being absolutely exhausted.  I will make it up on the last day of the Kung Fu week.  But I did get a chance to walk for 2 hours everyday.  Yesterday I practiced a random act of awesome and went ice skating right outside the Natural History Museum.  They were rockin' tunes from the 80's and even though it had been about 15 years since I last ice skated, it came back to me rather quickly.  Extreme success was met when after 2 hours of skating, I didn't fall once!!  Whoo-hoo!

Today's workout went well.  I did have some trouble performing the jump side kicks.  It was a bit challenging for my mind to tell my body to jump off this foot and then kick this foot out.  I was tired but I did the workout anyway. 

During my meditation, my mind was chattering like crazy.  Thinking about how the weekend went, wondering how I can keep the girls inspired and improving in their volleyball skills, thinking about what I need to do when I get home, etc...

Missed Bows

Ugh!  Again with the missed bow before I commence my workout!  And again I missed the bow after meditation.  How do I forget that one??  I mean I'm already, calm and collected and shouldn't I want to honor the light within me???  Ugh, meditation is making me frustrated- HA!  OK venting done, moving on.

The food is going well.  I miss Chipotle but I'm getting by.  This morning's breakfast seemed gigantic, hard boiled egg, avocado, tomatoes all sliced on top of some prairie gold bread (my favorite kind of whole wheat bread).  I suppose it would have made a nice picture, but alas it ended up in my belly in no time.

As for the 4 things Patrick asked for a few days ago, I have accomplished 1 out of the 4.  I tested my "cold, just woke up" forward fold.  I was still a good hand length from the floor, so yeah, I hope to see some improvement here.  I still need to test my ping-pong ball punching accuracy, jump to a specific height and finally take that photo.

I'm enjoying the Kung Fu workouts and in combination with bikram yoga...I'm feeling really good as of late physically.

Mindfulness

As I start to really delve into this Kung Fu program, I'm noticing it is definitely testing my patience.  I forget to do the bows before and after the workout.  I think I'm still used to the PCP lifestyle, and trying to cram in the workout everyday.  And though Patrick calls the progressions of the workout a "mess", I find myself still missing the mundane resistance bands, counting the numerous reps and going to failure.  KFB is just different.  I am happy I'm doing it, because to dedicate 3 months to stretching and being mindful everyday is something I haven't done yet.

The food part is going well.  It's nice to have set grammage for the day, although the first and second days I was just a bit hungry at night, craving more vegetables.  My go to protein is salmon and I have some really nice balsamic vinegar I use to flavor it.  Tonight it's tangerine infused balsamic vinegar.  Although I have found my favorite is Blackberry infused balsamic vinegar on my salmon.  I get the vinegar from this place called L.O.V.E. which specializes in olive oils and vinegars right down the street from me.  I feel lucky to have the it so close by!

Inside L.O.V.E.

   The store features these large stainless steel canisters which house the various infused olive oils and vinegars. I just finished my last L.O.V.E. bottle so I should be showing my face there soon to re-stock/try new flavors!

The End of Week One

The first week of KFB went flying by.  It's hard to make time to blog.  The jump rope and meditation went well.  Although, 10 minutes did feel significantly longer.  And I started to notice and a dull ache in my inner legs and mid back in the few last minutes of meditation.  Guess I just need to practice the stillness. 

I'm looking forward to the next week's nutrition plan and exercises.

I'm already Kung Fu-ey?? Neat.

During yesterday's workout I got a nice surprise.  I have a regular recreational volleyball league on Wednesday evenings and I didn't have a chance to do my workout in the morning.  So I decided to do the workout at the gym.  I found a nice cozy spot with little foot traffic and went at it.  While I was doing my forward straight kick's, a guy walked up to me and said, "What? Are you like training to be the next karate kid?"  I laughed and said, "No, they already made that movie!" He then when on to comment saying he was just kidding.  That he noticed I was very good at it and continued to mumble and walk away at the same time saying he made it up to green belt or something there of.  Anyway, I would have continued saying, "Umm, sure...really this is only my 5th day of doing kicks, but whatever!"  So that was an unexpected surprise.  To be told I look like I'm really good at doing kicks is kinda cool.  I've always been good at acting as if...acting as if I know what I'm doing...acting as if this is been something I've been doing for a long time.  Guess it helps keep me confident.  Not egotistical, I want to be informed when I'm wrong or that there might be a better way to do something, but the feeling of doing something right, that is something I really like.

Today's workout went by fast.  After watching the stances video, it really helped point out what I need to do better.  The meditation part went by so fast, it's as if I blinked and 5 minutes went by.  My mind was definitely racing though, thinking about the life I've made for myself and am I truly happy.

Looking forward to today.

New soreness!

So I've accomplished Day 4's workout and meditation.  I'm definitely sore from something, I believe it's the combination punches.  I can feel some back muscles that have never truly been worked that way before.  I must confess, I've been doing more jump roping / cardio warm-up than suggested on the workouts.  It's a habit that developed from PCP, daily jump roping / cardio.  Also, the sit-up portion, I've been doing more reps there as well.  It may sound silly, but I don't want to loose what I've maintained and developed physically through PCP.

The flexibility sections are testing my patience a bit.  My hips are tight. The workouts are not super challenging.  Maybe it's because I've kept up with the PCP workouts.  But even after the entire KFB workout, my body doesn't feel loose/warm enough to stretch.  I know, I know...KFB is going to swing into full force soon enough and I may find myself wishing I could just go back to a "nice" PCP workout.

The meditation portion is happening.  Not sure what to focus on but I have found it easy to soften my gaze and just be still and meditate for the 3-5 minutes.  The time goes by quickly, or maybe my brain is busy thinking about what the day has in store for me.

Patrick, when we take breathes during the stretching portion, should they be similar to yoga deep breathing - in through the nose and out through the mouth (with a nice HA sound)?  Nice long inhales followed by nice long exhales?  

Ready!

Close your mouth,
block off your senses,
blunt your sharpness,
untie your knots,
soften your glare,
settle your dust.
This is the primal identity.