100 days of practice (martial arts/qigong) challenge; prizes involved :D

[Astral Monk]

today, back to regular morning practice; feel i need to explore the small universe meditation more--guess I'll have to find time. Meanwhile, I'm endeavoring to be mindful about moving and taking taiji steps, using the Sun style stepping. Lots of chances to do this throghout the work day. Thats good but I'm really neglecting stretching.

 

8)

[Astral Monk]

 

MAN! My practice is crap yet! I've got a long way before i can catch up to that!!!

 

... :\

Yeah, me too. But as Chunyi says, good, better, best. Dedicating that much time to a practice is really a life shift, like going 'pro'.

 

I guess that means I'm still in the minors. Or maybe the beer league, lol.

 

8)

[BaguaKicksAss]

Actually the only important thing really is that you are doing better than you did last year, or perhaps the last few years. This could mean more practice, or perhaps more balance and actually taking a few breaks and meditating more.

 

Though that said, I was going through my books this evening... .

[Songtsan]

I don't formally practice every day, but I have pretty much integrated standing post into my daily affairs. Every time I stop at a red light, wait in line, or am standing around anywhere and everywhere, I take quarter squat position, cat stance, or various 1-legged positions...sometimes I wear my ten pound leg weights and I am getting a 45 lb weighted vest soon as well...

 

Some days I may do as much as 20 mins of bent knee work...usually at least 5 mins....its a start. Also I have a nice elliptical machine in my apartment and I take a low stance on that too...

[Astral Monk]

good ol morning SFQ; this evening worked on taiji stepping and other basics, with a burst of spontaneous bagua zhang movement in the middle.

 

8)

[Astral Monk]

This morning a sitting SFQ set using breathing of the universe and 10000 hands.

 

8)

[Astral Monk]

Though that said, I was going through my books this evening... .

 

Maybe it'd be appropriate to consult the I-Ching to decide the prize book(s)..!

 

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

I do need my own copy of the Yi Zhing hehe

My practice is still quite flimsy, but at least i got a good 15 minutes of Fan Zhang in last night before bed, and less than 10 minutes of square stepping.

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

Forgot to post yesterday, but nothing to report... the 30 minutes of FanZhang i did last night might make up for that though

[BaguaKicksAss]

Maybe it'd be appropriate to consult the I-Ching to decide the prize book(s)..!

 

Nah.

[dogson]

I'll start keeping detailed records... most days I do tai chi, followed by san ti or ichuan standing practice and I try to get yoga in to keep my knees/hamstrings open. Let's just start from today to be fair... I'm not out to win anything, just love the intent of this thread

 

I'm experimenting with the Pomodoro Technique (doing 25 minute chunks and then a 3-5 minute break) so I'll be posting my practice in tomato-sized chunks:

 

1 pomo tai chi

1 pomo san ti L side

1 pomo san ti R side

1 pomo zan zhuang

50 minute yoga podcast

I've found that when you are inspired to do something positive, DO IT.
Because (with me) when I think about it, that is almost the same as DOing it, and then i am much less likely TO do it because i spent too much thought on it... which is much lesser than TALKING about doing it, then i almost certainly won't do it.

 

This is so true for me Vanir. The days I wake up and immediately flow into action, I get way more done than the days I lay around thinking about what I want to do / should do. This is my complete understanding of zen, just bypassing my brain in favor of a deeper level of knowing, and really cool synchronicities show up when I'm in that mode. 5D?

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

I've got 6 objectives each day (maybe 6D? ) that i check off as i go. one of which i cannot check off until the next day.

Every morning, i attempt to write down my dreams; or as much as i can remember, i record my dreams and check that one off.
[x] Dream

Every day i spend as much time as i can meditating, either with conscious intent (american) or with complete emptiness (genuine). i dont always check off that box even if i do meditate. i try to only check it off when i am clear minded and reposed in emptiness.

However, if i have consulted the Yi Zhing about anything, i will accept thought-meditation and check it off if i feel i've come upon a revelation or clarity.
[x] Meditate

I'm finally getting back into the habit of morning stretches first-thing-first (or second if i dreamed )
[x] Stretch

[ ] Circles: I havent been walking the circle every day, and i am working toward filling this box every day. on days i do less than 15 minutes (my personal mandatory minimum) i'll put a small dot in that box to indicate i fucked with it even if i didnt work with it.

[x] Fan Zhang: I've gotten pretty good at getting my mandatory minimum of 15 every day. but i still have a lot of days i miss.

and the last one might not even be necessary - i am not really sure how much i need to - but for self-control practice, i attempt to retain. Semen retention is REALLY hard ( ) and i have only had roughly 2 out of 8 days of success, at best.

But good god how much more energy on subsequent days after success... squandered

[dogson]

Tai chi 25 minutes this morning, followed by San Ti 25 min each side, then yoga.

Went for a hike and did same amount of training again barefoot up in the mountains.

 

Had weird psychic moments twice today where I felt compelled to walk out to the street and talk to delivery people; both times they had packages for me with the wrong address.

 

Had another spontaneous urge to go hit a yin yoga class around sunset and it was one of the best of my life. The teacher must be a reiki or chi gong practitioner, her hands were burning hot but I didn't feel her projecting anything into me, as some do, I only felt it on the shen level. Like she was putting shine on my energy. Really beautiful.

 

Good practice day

[dogson]

Also Vanir, I'm also into retaining, agree that it's not the easiest thing in the world, especially because I'm constantly drinking maca / ashwagandha / tongkat ali smoothies - kinda like playing the video game on "nightmare mode"difficulty But I truly live in a different reality anywhere north of 15 days. Like on my hike earlier there were these black helicopters circling the mountain where I was training. As soon as I started practicing I felt into the sphere and cleared the whole mountain with my intent; the choppers left immediately. I do it with traffic, movie theaters, anywhere the energy feels tight / stagnant / tense. It's totally effortless, but if my own internal force isn't really built up my ability to do stuff like that is nonexistent. And I don't get cool intuition like knowing when packages are being delivered and when cute girls are looking at me across restaurants

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

wow... that's encouraging to work my self discipline more so that i even can retain

if i can get past a week, thereafter is simple... i know this from experience... only ever made it that far twice, but each time i didnt get ANY urges thereafter, except that im a total nymphomaniac and tend toward preferring constant gratification aaanyways, just that i know i can do it, combined with your description of intent-intensity... i think i ought to up the effort a few notches.

[dogson]

Hit the gym really hard today. no other training.

[Astral Monk]

today SFQ morning practice; some spontaneous taiji sword play in the evening; weapons forms are important in taiji..really, working with them is like doing push hands.

 

8)

[Astral Monk]

today tried a sitting version of SFQ.  I like this version. Recommend after any sitting session to tap the tailbone and hips and bounce on the heels a while.

 

8)

 

40

Edited February 19, 2015 by Astral Monk

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

I'm falling fast behind... Ahh....... meant to do some make-up training last night, but instead entangled myself in false hope and the subsequent severing of (all) hope involved :\ i cant take it, and i'm trying to go back to some exercises that can help with the emotional blockage, stagnation, and flooding i have experienced for so damn long...

And with hope that doing so will better aide me in returning to consistent practice, with emotional resolution.

[BaguaKicksAss]

I'm falling fast behind... Ahh....... meant to do some make-up training last night, but instead entangled myself in false hope and the subsequent severing of (all) hope involved :\ i cant take it, and i'm trying to go back to some exercises that can help with the emotional blockage, stagnation, and flooding i have experienced for so damn long...

 

And with hope that doing so will better aide me in returning to consistent practice, with emotional resolution.

 

The awesome and amazing thing about Bagua is, that with all the twisting and turning, it tends to wring you out, just like a wet towel all twisted up to get the water out....

[Songtsan]

I am getting the best results currently out of what I consider 'passive training' - such as those things I mentioned in my last post above....

 

Passive training isn't truly passive - I need a better term.

 

Another way to increase training time is to of course remove obstacles to training. Access is important -move nearer to a place where you will exercise, such as a park, gym, or martial arts studio, for example. And speaking of community, only keep friends who support you, never ones who derail you. You may have once had fun with those guys who liked nothing better than to drink a bunch of beer, get stoned and go to bars, but what does doing that stuff do for you anymore now that you are an adult? Having friends who will talk you into going hiking up a mountain, going to a movement arts intensive, etc. is priceless in my book.

 

While making life changers such as the above don't seem part of a daily training regimen, making the command decisions to undertake such alterations is in a little ways like taking a vow without taking a vow - it predisposes you to set up the cards to increase training time. I have never seen moves like this fail to produce fruit.

 

One obstacle I removed was to get rid of a video game system. When you get rid of what I like to call 'pressure relief valves,' i.e. things that are easy to do to remove suffering, to escape from the grind, etc. you invariably do something more worthwhile...

 

other things I have done include getting rid of netflix, getting rid of any fiction books, getting rid of comfy couches, etc.

 

You can take simple expressions of these and related principles such as, 'always take the stairs, never the elevator,' 'dont shop when hungry,' and become a real Nazi about it....such as doing 'never spend money on frivolties, only on things that will forward move me,' 'make all entertainments edutainments,' 'Only eat exactly as many calories as you need and never any extra,' etc.

 

If you practice these forms of 'ascetisisms' you will often find that you were really just being spoiled before...

 

Here is another one I am working on - when I walk, I try to keep a deeper bend in the knees - kind of a Groucho Mark walk....just a few extra degrees, but it really changes the way the force is absorbed up the chain....I have watched reflections of myself in windows as I walked and I can't really even tell I am doing it....I try to practice 'crow walking' (Kawa Chalasana) and various angles in between....to me this is one of the underlying practices in martial arts is the ability to stand or move with bent knees, so I want to keep strong from the least to greatest angles at the knees and hips.

 

They say that when doing isometrics, you get a 10-15 degrees strengthening effect at the joint angle you practice at...i.e. it doesn't apply so much beyond that...

 

I've been practicing doing my elliptical machine at 90 degree knee bends both forward and back, then I walk a few times back and forth across the room doing crow walking. I even practice 'no hands' 90 degree walk/jogging on the elliptical, which is pretty difficult.

 

Yesterday went on a snow hike, moving through some knee high drifts at times....I think that the extra ankle support required moving through deep snow is useful training...

 

[dogson]

Been focusing on 3 hours of practice right upon waking. In the past it's been tough to maintain discipline especially if I wake up too late - I feel sensitive to all the rushing and working people around me. The decision to train no matter what has totally shifted my psychology from being hypersensitive / receptive to a more male oriented focus, of doing exactly what I want regardless of the conditions around me.

 

Could be all the xingyi I'm doing too

 

EDIT: Went for a hike and did another hour of training. Found a hidden canyon near Hollywood with a HUGE stone labyrinth in it, totally mindblowing. I'm only in LA for a short period of time, and I'm finding that when I hold the intent of just being in the flow and holding a high vibe (like driving through holding a mudra and blessing the karma of millions of people in traffic) I seem to stumble upon really epic, sacred spots that I never would've found if I was focusing on being tied into the drama and fashion of the "scenes" here. Pretty cool how you can find real magic anywhere.

Edited February 6, 2015 by dogson

[Astral Monk]

morning practice today, focussing on 10000 Hands, an SFQ exercise inspired by Kuan Yin (or rather, the 10000 arm Avolekitsvara). I am finding the gentle rotations bring a cooling sensation to the shoulders.

 

8)

[Vanir Thunder Dojo Tan]

Walked a tight circle in my room last night before going to sleep, but i didnt check the clock before i started.
However, it was not very long. i did a palm change every 360 degrees, and 2 of each palm changes.

So.... i'll guess it was between 8 and 13 minutes at best.

*sigh* VERY inconsistent practice...

[dogson]

Half hour of tai chi yesterday, followed by a solid run, yoga afterwards, and another half hour of tai chi at sunset.

It's cool how I can feel when the energy of sunrise/sunset comes, even in gritty downtown LA. It's like the whole planet gets covered in this beautiful energy, and I *have* to practice. It wakes me up even if I went to sleep at 3AM.

 

Also had crazy dreams about mushroom extracts Maybe my reishi elixirs are getting a bit out of control...