Relaxing the upper body.. aka “drop your shoulders”

 alignment, Martial Arts  No Responses »
Feb 242009
 

A friend of mine wrote about shoulder relaxation.. Apparently we both had the same mental block, but he solved it first – shoulder relaxation (and by extension, all relaxation) can be done up/down and … forward/back!

At first I didn’t think I had that issue, my western mind automatically went “Nah, I don’t have that issue, my shoulders are nice and straight!” .. And then training kicked in and the answer came : “Well, maybe they’re not supposed to be straight!”
So, I let my shoulders round forward a little, which required some spinal and pelvic adjustments.. But the result is that I suddenly ‘stopped feeling’ my shoulders and upper back.
For my friend, who is more advanced than I am, the effect was more drastic, and he became aware quickly of more changes, like his arms being properly connected to the body, and feeling better rooted in spite of not having his legs bent as much.
I’m still playing with the feeling, the muscles around my spine don’t know what to do with this weight, I think.. I’ve got to work on this some more ;-)
Still, this is a good discovery.

 Posted by Trevoke at 3:33 pm  Tagged with: , ,

More stances and some testing

 Martial Arts, sparring, testing  No Responses »
Feb 052009
 

So, I’ve been trying to keep my stances down a lot more now – it’s making me much more aware of when I get tense.. Because I rise, because my ankles, hips and knees just don’t flex. It’s an interesting experience.
Two people are testing.. During sparring, that evening was the first time that I made a conscious point of “the first thing I do is move – and then answer”. I’m feeling good about this change, in addition to keeping slightly lower stances during sparring – mobility much increased and there is a lot more potential there.
Something to work on…

 Posted by Trevoke at 11:52 pm  Tagged with:

stances

 Martial Arts  No Responses »
Jan 272009
 

Tonight we had training on stances. It came about more or less accidentally – proper stances are -hard- !! But I am now flexible enough hip-wise to get there.. Now to train my leg muscles, mostly the quads, to follow suit…

 Posted by Trevoke at 12:47 am  Tagged with:

Nidan… ?

 Martial Arts  No Responses »
Jan 062009
 

Well, sensei hinted last month that maybe I should start gearing up for a nidan test. I’ve been getting used to being shodan, which maybe is a bad thing, but I haven’t stopped looking for things I could do better. I’m becoming more sensitive to the muscles in my back, and I think my shoulders are finally beginning to open up…

So, I have something like 5 months to prepare.. Or, you know, whenever it turns out sensei thinks I’m ready. I’d better start doing more pushups.

 Posted by Trevoke at 4:10 pm

More students testing

 Martial Arts, testing  No Responses »
Dec 192008
 

This week two more students tested. We have a new green belt and a new blue belt. They did pretty well, but I am completely amazed at how many excuses adults have. Their heads are full of them. Can’t they just listen and say ‘yes’ like they were taught when they were kids? Talking back is a privilege, not a right.
Ooh.. That’s good.. I’ll reuse that.

 Posted by Trevoke at 10:43 pm  Tagged with: ,

An old-school 6th dan

 food for thought, Martial Arts  No Responses »
Nov 042008
 

Yesterday evening a man who trained about as long as sensei came to train with us. Black obi, rather frayed to white. He’d trained a long time under his uncle, and then ~15 years under sensei’s sensei. He’d taken a break for a while, so he was a bit out of shape, but his mindset, his attitude, his devotion were 100% into everything he did – an important lesson which I forget all too often.

He left, very happy to have joined us. I hope we’ll see him again.

 Posted by Trevoke at 3:44 pm  Tagged with:

Kali sticks

 drills  No Responses »
May 152008
 

Yesterday we had a small class, so we were able to each work on what we needed. I, hopefully, now have the full chatan yara no sai form, so I just need to work it..

We did some kali stick work. The yellow and blue belt had never seen those drills before so we started with a simple high-low-high, but we did try for a little bit the sinawali drills, specifically heaven, because that one’s fun :) Kali sticks are very good to work follow-through, speed and flow, and god knows I need that.

 Posted by Trevoke at 8:13 am  Tagged with: ,

Testing for purple

 testing  No Responses »
May 012008
 

Monday and yesterday, two blue belts were to test for purple. They went through their calisthenics and basics; I did not see their forms on Monday, but I did see them on Wednesday. They were bad enough sensei wanted to see them again, that much I understood, but not sure how bad until I saw them both.

Neither of them broke a sweat until fighting, not for the 100 jumping jacks, not for the 60 push-ups, not for the multiple kick combinations. They did get out of breath when doing all the forms in a row, at least…
Neither displayed the spirit we expected from a blue belt.. Let alone from someone testing. A test is supposed to be the hardest thing you’ve done to date and you’re supposed to work as hard as you can.. And that’s usually noticeable. Further, their forms weren’t even up to blue belt level. Chances are they did not practice outside the dojo.. Or even think about the art at all. While some people do martial arts leisurely, you should either expect to stop progressing or realize that work needs to go into it.

One of the blue belts seemed OK with the postponement and stayed to speak with sensei.. The other one pretty much stormed out.. Well, we’ll see what happens now.
You have to TRAIN !

 Posted by Trevoke at 3:07 pm  Tagged with: ,

Solved my left shoulder pain?

 alignment  No Responses »
Apr 152008
 

Is it a worrying trend that I write mostly about pain in here? :)

Every once in a while, usually while doing a high block with my left arm, I’d feel a pain in my left shoulder. It felt like a part was rolling over another one.. Muscle over bone, or something like that. It’s not pleasant and is the kind of pain that stops your movement quite short and quite abruptly.

It happened yesterday while doing an uppercut (or, you know, punch to under the jaw/to the throat/etc). I realized my body alignment was wrong and my left elbow wasn’t kept in properly. As soon as I fix that, I think, I’ll feel a lot better about the whole thing :)

This of course begs the question.. What else am I not aligning properly, but maybe not quite wrong enough to get pain from it?

 Posted by Trevoke at 11:21 am  Tagged with:
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