Addendum to today's blog

This is an addition to today's blog. I left out the best part of the "rock" analogy. If you fill your jar with all the little rocks first, there's no room left for the big rocks. If however, you put the big rocks in first, the little rocks will slip in and fill the space remaining. So big rocks first!

Life's Rocky Road

I used to think that I was an organized person and certainly compared to my husband, I am haha. But now it’s more like crisis management all the time and this causes a few problems. First of all, a great deal does get accomplished and I am organized enough, well most of the time anyway, to get the high priority items taken care of on time. However, I think that crisis management indicates that we have too many things on our plates and while we may be skimming the red items at the top of our lists, the “lesser important” blue items (these colors are referring to degrees of need intensity) get moved to the bottom and often ignored. Unfortunately for many of us, the red items which consist of deadlines mostly are ultimately in the grand scheme of things, not that important compared to the blue items below which consist of items of the “stop and smell the roses” ilk or general health and well-being items.

We know we are supposed to put ourselves high on the list to maintain health and sanity. We know our children are growing and learning around us all the time and require our undivided attention and love full-time, not to mention the fact that they won’t be children forever. Our marriages need to be nurtured and appreciated. But the client deadline is tomorrow, the utility bill is due, the emails must be sent to potential kung fu students, everyone is out of underwear and the dog is almost out of food. How do we get around the not-so-important, yet important, red items?

Author Steven Covey makes the suggestion of making a list of your big rocks (long term important items, like exercise, time with your kids) and your little rocks (your daily “to do” list of red items). Fill your jar (or your schedule) with the big rocks first and then the little rocks will fill in the cracks. It sounds great and we get the point, but does that really get it all done? I’m just pondering out loud really, because if I had THE answer, I’d be writing a book about it RIGHT NOW!

So lately, I’m trying to approach it by making sure that everyday has some big rocks in it. So today for instance, I answered my business related emails this morning and prepared the packets to mail to those parties. I started the laundry and made some steel cut oats for everyone. Then I’m taking the kids to the gym for my workout and then the pool for some fun.  After that, kids will practice piano and saxophone and do some reading while my daughter and I make a birthday cake for my husband. I’ll answer emails again, and do some more laundry. The evening is dedicated to celebrating the birth of my wonderful husband 46 years ago – so that’s definitely devotion to a big rock. (That sounded odd,, but let’s move on). It’s still crisis management (mopping? What is that? Caulking the bathtubs? You’re kidding right?) but many things get done, both big and little rocks included. I just have to rotate through the big rocks so that everything gets in there eventually.

So I guess for now I’m saying, be sure to tackle some big rocks everyday for peace and happiness in the long term. Deadlines are met or missed, but your family, your health, your sanity… are the flagstones of your path through life J

Caring is at the Heart of It All

I have not blogged since my brother passed away two months ago. But I feel a little more like writing now and I thought to tackle a subject that my brother actually excelled at and that is the art of being personable.

Our dad was always a cut-up with people, friendly and chatty with people at the check out counter, in a restaurant, anywhere. Our mother was more suspicious, I think, less likely to strike up a conversation with someone or to let her guard down – though when she got older, more confident perhaps, that changed and she too was a personable woman. So it makes sense that my brothers and I are similar. But my brother Mark was a “give you the shirt off his back” kind of guy. He was a true listener, he would let out a great laugh if you told him something funny, he would give you his heart if you told him something sad and he would stop and admire everything that is beautiful in the world when he saw it and point it out to you so you wouldn’t miss it. He would tell people what he loved about them, he was fearless and wonderful. I will miss him forever.

Eye Contact

I went to Whole Foods on Sunday and enjoyed a few moments in the check out line with the young man who was ringing up my purchases. He looked me straight in the eye when he greeted me, such that I realized I was already shifting my gaze away, stopped and dragged it back. I did this because I realized he was really trying to be in the moment and connect with who he was interacting with right then. He wasn’t just throwing out the perfunctory greeting while focusing on sliding my eggplants onto the scale. He was, in fact, doing his job with the items, but still greeting me in a very friendly, “human on the planet relating to another human” sort of way. I realized that eye contact and actual connection like that, are a huge part of enjoying each moment of your day. I’m trying harder to include it in mine.

Listening

I’m also trying to improve my listening skills. How do you be a better listener? You actually listen to the speaker, rather than running your inner commentary while they’re talking. “What the hell does he mean by that?, Where did I leave my keys? If she thinks I’m going to buy that, she can think again. What is my son doing over there in the corner? Man I’m hungry. Etc…. 

Smiling

We bump into people every day, every where and not everyone is having their best day. Sometimes they glare at you, snap at you or are a little curt. That’s not your fault or anything you can fix, but it doesn’t have to make you feel sad or angry. Maybe if we just smile, we’ll see it turn their day around a little, and then your smile will grow inward and make you feel good too. It’s a win, win! I will keep shooting for it anyway because if you smile in the forest and there’s no one around to see you smile, did you really smile? Who cares?! Keep on smiling!

So I’m everywhere on this blog – out of practice, but the point is – what came so easily to my brother, can be obtained I think, by us all if we just practice these common courtesies, live in the moment and stop to smell the roses. In our school, I'm comfortable and these things come easily. Outside of my comfort zone is where I need to really work on these principles. Caring is at the heart of it all.

When overwhelmed….Workout!

We are all very busy these days, with very few exceptions. And it is often difficult to accomplish everything in a day or a week, that we feel needs to be accomplished. I learned from my husband early in our marriage that I was assigning far too much importance to things that could be left for another day. I would begin a nice day with the words, “I have SO much to do today!” and begin to sink into a depression before I’d ever had my morning coffee (a family trait). He would ask me to tell him what all of these things were that were going to engulf my day and when I said them out loud, I would realize the foolishness of my thoughts. “I have to do the laundry, and go to the store. I have to dust and vacuum. I need to call mom and mail a bill. And I have to be a work by 5.”  Those were the good old days – now my to do list is about 50X longer than that!

He would then demand to know why at least half of those things had to be done today. Why couldn’t the dusting and vacuuming be done tomorrow when we were both off and he could help? Was there in fact, anything on that list aside from the 5 pm work deadline that had to be done today? And so I became better (though I do still get overwhelmed) at prioritizing AND over the years I discovered that one of the top priorities has to be that which allows me to blow off some anxious energy and relax, the daily workout. (Thank you Kung Fu!)

The next couple of weeks are an example of this for me. We have pending birthday parties at home, a dinner for our amazing teachers, a tournament, out of town guests, Easter is in there, a group run, some early release and off days for the kids, and an out-of-town trip for my husband. This is all grouped with all of the daily house and business chores that I take care of, childcare and meals. I know that anyone reading this has their own similar list because as I said before, we are all busy people. But the key to surviving it all and hopefully pulling it off with aplomb and bravado, is organizing, prioritizing and….the daily workout.

So throw out anything that can be done another day (without messing up that day) or doesn’t really need to be done at all. Organize the rest into a plan of what needs to be done by when and then prioritize a list each day that will get what must be done completed by the time it must be done. Most importantly however, at the top of that daily list, place your daily workout or whatever that thing is that you do which keeps you sane. And try to remember to savor every precious moment of your crazy day!

Teaching Kids Kung Fu

We often say that teaching the pre-k kung fu classes are the most fun and yesterday was no exception. But one of our adult students began teaching for the first time yesterday and it reminded me of some wonderful benefits. I won’t say his name, but I will paraphrase what he said to me at the end of class, which was something like, “I think they are going to teach me a lot more than I am teaching them!” He was referring to patience, looking at things from the child’s perspective and that of their parents watching from the sidelines. Many of us speak to our children, teach our own children very differently from the way we would teach other kids. Often we expect more from our children than from others, but when placed in a roomful of youngsters of varying abilities and cognizance, we realize that as every child is different, we must often alter the way we teach each one and the way we interact with them. One child might throw a beautiful side-kick from the onset, while another appears to have a twitchy foot. The day that twitchy foot rises up an inch or two and has a tiny snap to it, the teacher recognizes that THAT is the best side-kick that child has thrown yet and yells “Alright! Way to go!” And this is one of the pleasures of teaching the little ones – seeing them grow in ability and self-esteem. Seeing that huge grin explode over their faces as you yell “That’s it!” and high-five them.

Our teachers volunteer their time and skill to teach and while the teachers of the older kids and adult students get the chance to really hone the material and know it inside and out, the pre-k teachers don’t get that particular benefit. The pre-k material only gets through about yellow belt before the kids are old enough to join the next class, so pre-k teachers only focus on the junior techniques and white and yellow belt material. BUT we have the chance, as that new adult teacher pointed out, to really develop our personal patience, joy of the moment and perpetual experience of childhood as seen through the eyes of the pre-k students. We get to be involved in helping young ones learn a sense of self, get comfortable with new things like material, balance, left and right, all of which lead to a child with confidence and self-pride. We become very observant as well, noting the child’s attention and interest levels, whether they are feeling frustrated or empowered, and if they are ready to take that twitchy foot to the next level. The kids are incredible, the parents are incredible to commit to bringing their children so regularly to class – as regular attendance helps them feel confident in their material (and therefore confident in class) and moving forward. Our volunteer teachers work jobs all day and come flying in at 4:45 to teach pre-k and most stay another hour or more to help teach the older kids too! That’s incredible!! And Saturday mornings when they could be sleeping in or outside, they are there at the school by 10:30 am to teach. Obviously they’ve realized what I paraphrased at the beginning, “the kids teach us a lot more than we teach them”.

When Motivation Wanes

I’m going to draw a lot from my husband’s words and conversations for this blog because in his 28 + years of kung fu, he’s seen many ebbs and flows of motivation and interest among students of all levels. These fluctuations are very typical and result from many things, how one deals with them however, can mean the difference between fulfillment and lifelong discontent!

When someone enters into any new activity, the newness is often the greatest motivator. The excitement of the new activity, the purchase of new equipment, the new effects on your body and energy level and the new atmosphere (from the physical surroundings to the people in it) are sufficient to keep you motivated until….well, until the “newness” wears off. The length of time for this “honeymoon” phase depends on the richness of the experience, the amount of actual new material to be gleaned and on the individual response. But even in a system like ours where the over 900 forms make it virtually impossible to run out of “new” material, the newness of the experience becomes more routine after a while. And once this excitement wears off, the student might begin to notice, perhaps subconsciously, that now going to class also means a hard workout, a challenging mental experience and they feel kind of tired today. Also the class seems to have changed for them – it’s not as exciting as it was initially and they might put this down to a change in the class itself, rather than in their perception of the class. Now they must draw upon inner strength to motivate themselves. Some people just don’t have it in them to do that. The ones who do (and there are MANY) continue on to their class and continue to grow, learn and evolve and the people who can’t get over that hump, often move on to something “new”. They decide the old activity or hobby was deficient in some way, had let them down, was lacking in some quality or other and off they go to a “new” activity with new equipment, new effects on their body and energy level, new building, new people,… until eventually that activity lets them down too. They dig many shallow wells, as our Grandmaster has said, never digging deep enough to find water.

The student that can climb over these humps will have to do it repeatedly. Over the years, challenges periodically rear their heads. Sometimes it’s something physically or mentally difficult, sometimes it’s just a level of fatigue or a lack of confidence. And sometimes the student must work without motivation until that “wall” has been scaled, much like a runner’s “wall” that once has been busted through, results in a fresh, second wind and renewed motivation. Sometimes the student must ask themselves some questions like “Why am I doing this and what do I want out of it?” to remind themselves of the goal and the prize. But the successful student perseveres and eventually finds their inner peace, their love of every moment of their classes and their lives outside the class. The training to become a black belt that you started the day you joined the school, becomes training for lifelong fulfillment. The obstacles you encounter along the path are the training and how you deal with them, determines your future.

Kung Fu Women

Kung Fu Women

I being, a kung fu woman, have a very direct perspective on this topic and want to throw some insight out there into what it might mean for a woman trying a kung fu class for the first time. First of all, this is an age-dependent issue I think as older generations (like me) feel like they are stepping out of their comfort zone by entering what was always a male-dominated recreation. Younger women probably don’t have as much of an issue with that as today’s society is more integrated and accepting of such equality. The good news though, is that at least at our school, 1/3 of the students are women and many of them are 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th and even 5^th degree black belts. There are no gender divisions at our school, except those created by me haha when I organize a women’s demo or our upcoming retreat – but that’s more a celebration than a division and to let women who haven’t joined yet, know that there is a large, family of men and women at Shaolin-Do ready to welcome them to class. Though as I pointed out to Sifu Corey at class last week, it’s hard to look tough when you have this pony tail swinging back and forth during forms!