Nate's Blogs

This year, my weapon is the broadsword. This is my fourth year in I Ho Chuan and this is my first weapon that isn’t a dual weapon (I previously did dual daggers, twin axes and tonfas). I must admit that making this form is a bit of challenge. I find that with a weapon in each hand I become more versatile and have a lot more that I can do compared with only one weapon that I can either hold in one hand or both. However I’ve been finding that I’m noticing a more strong connection between my left, right, top and bottom. Although this weapon is starting off as a challenge, I feel like if I really dedicate myself to it, it will help my Kung Fu immensely. Now I’m wondering to myself what benefits of learning even more different styles of weapons like nunchucks for example. 

As I have progressed from my brown belt to a junior black this weekend I have reached a goal that I’ve been striving for for 12 years. However with the goal at its end, the journey is just beginning. One of the many things that I took away from this process is that it is all about the journey. Not the destination. However you never know where your journey will take you. As long as you keep kung fu as a priority, you know the journey will be a good one. Everyone has their journeys and each journey has their own ups and downs, turns and dead ends. Remember your journey for it is what makes you, you. 

  With another year at its end, I have officially completed my third year in I Ho Chuan. This year was defiantly my best. It consisted of many successes and also many failures. Some of my successes include passing the black belt grading and making headway into fixing my posture during forms. Forms have been one of my main focuses this year and I feel like it’s paid off. My shoulders are more relaxed and I’m keeping a steady intent throughout. It’s important to learn form both failure and successes, not just the failures. Figure what you did right and continue to do it. Figure out what you did wrong and adjust your approach as necessary. Additionally, everything was changing due to covid which means that this year was no where near the same as the the other years. This year has been an extraordinary year for all of us and I am proud that I was a member of it. I’m looking forward to see new faces this upcoming year and many of you guys again

 This weekend, my fellow candidates and the black belts getting promoted all had the opportunity to get our forms filmed at hasse lake. It was freezing yet enjoyable. One of the couple thing that I learned from this experience is bodily awareness in different environments. Typically I do my forms inside while I’m warm and on mats. On Saturday I did it outside, in snow and below -30° weather. There was all different kinds of obstacles I’ve rarely faced before while doing a form. Like getting my foot caught in snow or slipping and falling. It put another thought in my head during the form. This then leads into the idea of doing the form to educated, not just to do the form. If my form was only committed to muscle memory I would have had a troubling time in a new environment, just how when we turn 90° before doing a form, it puts our bearings off.