SlowBear

This is excellent advice and some I may follow through with eventually. I'm not ready to get another dog yet. I had one that my ex-wife and I rescued a few years back. My ex kept her in the divorce. Honestly more sad about that than the divorce in a lot of ways. She was definitely my best friend.

Hello everyone! My name is Johnathan. I'm a lifelong martial artist who has always held philosophical Daoism in high regard and would love to learn and integrate true Daoist practices into my life. I just got divorced last month and, despite being a pretty dang good martial artist and fighter, I'm quite honestly in poor health. I have found myself in a state where, though I interact with the world around me, I experience a profound disconnection with everything. So I guess I'm here for a couple of reasons. First, I am hoping that by integrating Daoist practices into my life that my mental and physical health will improve. Secondly, I'm hoping to make friends and find community. Can't wait to meet you all! -Johnathan

This set will live rent free in my brain forever.

This place was named with no understanding of innuendo or wordplay.

My path is what it is, so if I must see it through, I must. It's not anything I have chosen though. The sensation of my interactions are a bit like having a sheet of plexiglass between me and everything else, some barrier mentally that keeps me from being able to fully engage with my environment. My suspicion is that my mind is unconsciously numbing to keep unpleasant feelings at bay. Hard to get going in the mornings. I have a known norepinephrine deficiency and was given Wellbutrin. That was helping for a while, but now it's not doing the job and I don't want to go up in dosage if I can figure something else out. Before this turns into too long of a ramble, I will end the post here. As a verbal (and apparently textual) processor, I will write forever if given opportunity.

To clarify, I was able to post in the Welcome section. When I clicked on the Newcomer Corner section, I couldn't find an option to post within that section. As I tell people when they ask me about my martial arts practice, I've been a "jackass-of-all-trades" type of martial artist my entire life. I blame Bruce Lee. Started in highschool at 14 with TKD/American Kenpo for four years. Kickboxing in college. When I moved up to Dallas for about two years off and on, I was doing Krav Maga and Bujinkan Ninjutsu. Off and on, I've also done some Wing Chun, Karate, Boxing, MMA, Kajukenbo, and Kali. Not enough to write home about with a lot of it(and I've probably left a bunch out), but enough to help give me context for my martial art. One of the biggest lessons I've taken over the years is that it's all about context. It's not that the people who came before us were not great fighters, but rather that they were working from the context of dealing with or engaging in armed combat. That and commercialization over time. My interest over the past couple of years has been with the internal arts, particularly with Yiquan. Though with no teacher at the moment (money and time), I've been left to what I can gather on my own via YouTube and books. I will say that Zhan Zhuang practice has definitely yield some interesting results with power and relaxed structure. TLDR: DONE A BUNCH CRAP😛