Knee Bone's Connected to the Leg Bone, Etc.

Goddamn I'm frustrated.

About 7 months back I started having a lot of pain in my left knee. So, since I'm not a total idiot, I eased up on the intensity of my training and stopped sparring to give myself some time to recuperate. Annoying, because I was starting to feel really good about my sparring -- I felt like my instincts were finally starting to help offset my big 42-year-old body's limitations. I was enjoying sparring more than I ever had. But well, what's the big deal, right? Short term time-out to recover, then I'm back on the mat. Right?

Six weeks later, still no sparring, still no improvement in the pain in my knee. Plus my leg started giving out, feeling weak and fatigued all the time.

So, I start physical therapy. Get a big-ass cortisone injection in my knee. The pain starts to let up, and PT helps me regain the strength and retrain the muscles in my leg. But then, thanks to the wonderful yin/yang relationship of the right side to the left side of the body, I manage to injure my right ankle while I compensate for the weakness in my leg and adjust to the new mobility in my left knee. More pain. More time away from sparring.

Next up, my left foot gets all screwed up. Probably from adjusting my gait and technique to accommodate the injured right knee. More pain. More time away from sparring.

Then, just as it's getting better and I'm starting to feel ready-to-go, I do a trade show in Nashville and spend 16 hours a day on my feet in dress shoes. Totally screws my lower back up, activating my old sacrum injury. Big, hot pain in the back of my hammies on my right leg, numbness and tingling in my toes, stabbing pain in the bottom of my foot. I begin doing some ad hoc PT on my own to try to mobilize the nerve trunk and get the pain to ease off. It ... kinda works.

Next, I continue training through the pain. I've got Nationals coming up in less than two months, and my physical therapist told me that while I may be in pain the training isn't going to make things worse. I just need to dial it down a bit. Kick a little lower.

And, of course, continue to not spar.

But the pain doesn't let up, and now after 5 weeks of waiting (and, truth be told, avoiding dealing with this) I've got yet another appointment with my PT to try to get these chronic pain issues squared away. Hopefully tomorrow I'll get a better idea of what I need to do to get this under control.

I'm really, really frustrated. It's not so much the pain, per se. I'm used to pain, and since I know I'm not actually making things worse right now by training a big part of what I've been focusing on in training through these injuries is getting myself to just accept pain and work through it, to not anticipate it and mess up my technique as a result.

This has been successful, to an extent -- my forms are looking pretty solid when I'm having a good day and I'm not too shot. At this rate my Chil Sung will be looking pretty good for competition come July, assuming I can hit the ring fresh and rested. Stamina and performance-wise I'm good for three or four times through before the pain makes it hard to execute some of the tougher techniques in the form well. So I'll just need to save my energy for go-time come July.

But it's hard to enjoy training when you spend half of your time biting your lip, or getting pissed off for the way you whiffed what just a few months ago was a fairly easy technique. It's hard to devote so much energy to ... not letting pain stop you from proceeding, or at least finishing, what you set out to do, even when all you're trying to do is get through 75 minutes of class.

And here I am, 7 or more months without sparring. I watch the guys sparring at the end of class, and all I can think is ... man, when I finally manage to get back in there I am going to SUCK.

Sigh. Grrr.

Wish me luck on my appointment tomorrow. Hopefully I can get ahead of these injuries and get back to where I need to be. Only have a year until my Ee Dan test, which I also hope to be a Kyo Sa test as well. I have a lot of shit to do. I need to get it done.

Mood: Less than pleased

Now Playing: Nothing.

Gratitude

Yup, an entire month has passed since my last entry. Annoying.

So, as I mentioned a solid 5 weeks back, no big breakthroughs, no big insights or epiphanies these days. Still trianing a solid 3-4 nights a week minimum, but real life concerns continue to dominate my thoughts and training continues to be part of my day that makes nearly-intolerable situations more tolerable. Happily, the "release" aspect of training hasn't come at the cost of progress: my technique is improving, I think. My new forms are getting more and more solid: Jin Do , Naihanchee Ee Dan and Dando Hyung Cho Dan are all doing just fine, and I finally feel I have enough of a grasp of Chil Sung Sah Rho (the best of these four new forms -- by far, IMHO) to move from "remembering" to "polishing." It's a beautiful form, and I find its rhythms and pace fascinating. I look forward to exploring it more over the next year.

Lately I've been thinking about my training from a perspective of gratitude. Obviously I've been under some pressure lately and I'm grateful for the positive release Tang Soo Do offers, but that's actually a very small part of the debt I feel to this art, and to my instructors and friends. Lately I've been taking a look at my life and how it's changed in the past four, nearly five years, how I've changed and how much farther I have to go to become the person I wish and hope I can become. And time and again I come back to my training, my instructors, my friends in TSD and realize with profound gratitude what this art has given to me.

This past week this point was driven home in an unexpected, but incredibly welcome, way. Kyo Sa Nim Jimmy Vasquez came home for a couple of weeks of weeks from his current homebase with the Air Force )in California) to visit his family, and he trained with us quite often s a result. While I often mention the influence my friend and instructor Sa Bom Nim Hoke Nunnan has on me in this blog, I've rarely mentioned Jimmy, and honestly this is a failing on my part. Jimmy is, in many ways, directly responsible for my choosing to stick with the art past the first couple of ranks, and for helping me to see Tang Soo Do as a family activity that could help me to connect with and spend time with my wife and kids in new ways.

When I first started training, I was overwhelmed by the art, and by Sa Bom Nim. He seemed too ... *much* to me. Initially I 'd thought he was arrogant, but later I realized he was simply confident and I was insecure. But even then his skill and ability seemed to be too big to approach, and I felt ridiculous even trying. I saw other students who were so far beyond my physical abilities and skills that is was almost like they were another species entirely. It took me a solid 2 years to begin to believe in myself, to believe I could get to blue belt. And a lot of the credit for my being able to believe could do it, I could get there, belongs entirely to Jimmy.

Jimmy demystified many aspects of the art for me and made me feel more able and less ridiculous. His skill, while always formidable, never seemed the result superhuman ability or the result of natural gifts, but rather of single-minded dedication and hard work. He helped me to realize that with hard work I could achieve the results that seemed so effortless in others.

I've of course since learned that those others worked hard too, but it took a few years to gain that perspective. And Jimmy's good humor, dedication, encouragement, and steadfast example helped guide me to the place where I could see these truths.

I won't even get into the ways in which he helped my family grow together in his Saturday family classes, beyond simply saying that now that now that I teach Saturday classes now and again my first goal each and every time is to try to teach a class that Jimmy would approve of. Jimmy's Saturday classes were something very special, and I hope that someday I can build the sort of goodwill and camaraderie he did among this unusual subset of students.

So, for that, I am incredibly grateful. Thank you, Kyo Sa Nim.

Mood: Wistful
Now Playing: The Blue Nile, "Hats"

Distractions

Yup, another long pause between posts. Oddly, I feel like I have less and less to say about my training, lately. Not that I've lost focus or interest -- anything but, honestly -- but I find that recently breakthroughs, observations, and epiphanies are far more scarce. In other words, I'm plugging away, but my training hasn't surfaced anything I feel particularly compelled to share.

I will note a couple of moments of significance, though, if only for documentary purposes and for my own reference later. I will note that February 2010 marks the point where I've actually articulated to my instructor that I want to teach, and to move into a role that has more official responsibilities within our dojang in the future. The boundaries of this role are difficult to define at present, and the timeline on which they will occur more difficult still: could be weeks, months, or more.

But it's a goal. I have a lot of responsibilities to my family that I can't simply ignore, but stating this intention out loud to my instructor, mentor, and friend, and hearing him express encouragement and happiness with my decision, was a special moment for me. All journeys begin with a single step: this is simply the beginning of yet another journey. When the next steps will occur is difficult to say, but I'm on the path regardless.

Also of note is my recognition of just how much of an impact stress can have on my training. Without getting into too many details, I'll just note that I am under a fairly significant amount of stress at present. I am happy to say it has nothing to do with anything that is truly important. My family and friends are healthy and well, as am I. But the past couple of months have been difficult.

And through all of this, my dojang family and Tang Soo Do training have once again provided a refuge, a place of peace where I can channel and vent the stress of my life. All of which is, obviously, good. But it's not without its own frustrations. One thing I've noticed is that it's much harder right now for me to remember technique, to recall things I've learned in the past months. I typically pride myself on my ability to call up technical aspects of our art easily, and lately this has not been the case.

It's been a bit of a challenge to let myself off the hook for this. I'm a perfectionist by nature, and when I trip up on stuff like this I tend to beat myself up a whole lot. Under normal circumstances I can use this impulse as a way to motivate myself to train harder, to focus more, devote more time to technique and practice.

But I've had to acknowledge that right now, right here in this time and place, I need to be grateful for the benefits of release. I think I'm letting so much negativity out when I train that my mind is grateful for the chance to just be ... empty. And as a result it's not eager to allow new knowledge in. I spend a lot of time wondering why things that my peers are grasping quickly seem to ricochet off my mind. I laugh it off, but it's not a particularly positive feeling. After several weeks of struggling with it, though, I've realized that I need to listen to what my mind and my heart are telling me about what I need from Tang Soo Do right now.

Putting my pride in learning and performing on the shelf and simply accepting that at this time this is how I need to practice my art hasn't always been easy. But I also recognize that this is part of embracing our art as a part of my life, not just something I'm learning. As Sa Bom Nim Nunan said to me recently, when I once again passed on sparring due to my own nervousness about the ongoing recovery of my left knee, "It's OK. You're in this for the long haul."

And it's true. I am. And sometimes that means that I need to accept that my life, my immediate circumstances or concerns, might interfere with my ability to learn new technique.

And that's OK. I'm 42, and in 30 years I hope to still be doing Tang Soo Do, every day, to the best of my ability. Part of that means accepting that the benefits of Tang Soo Do aren't confined to learning new technique, new hyungs, new terminology. Sometimes, the greatest benefit of this art is simply -- or not so simply -- being able to end the day with a shrug, a roll of my eyes, a wry smile at the absurdity of my life, and a good night's sleep.

Mood: Fairly mellow
Now Playing: Angelo Badalamenti, "Mulholland Drive"