Kishi

Goal 1: 0/1

Goal 2: 0/1

Goal 3: 1/1

Not my strongest start, but it's not about how you start. It's about how you finish.

I spent most of yesterday sleeping too late and getting in my head about the challenge (hence my statement that I've got a bunch of interconnected problems). Took a lot of time to think before realizing that the solutions are relatively simple and that they can be introduced in a relatively easy way.

Or at least, I think so. We'll see in the next 5 weeks.

Anyway, I didn't do my movement or make the open mat yesterday, so no credits there. Did, however, take in-depth notes. Which I was surprised to find that I kind of need a little bit, since roundhouse is actually one of the ones I do pretty ok.

Today would normally be a chance for me to get to the mats, but I'm in the office again thanks to my trainee, so I'm not going to get to go out and do that tonight. I'll take credit for it; no particular reason for to let the job hurt the challenge. Still need to go walk a while and take my notes, though. As for Nerd Night tonight, we are apparently going to finish the D&D game we started weeks ago. I'm skeptical, but I'm sure I'll have fun either way.

Hi.

I'm going to vague post a bit for now, and I apologize, but having thought about what I want I basically have to conclude that I don't really have the time to explain everything in detail.

The very short version is that I've spent the past week thinking about what I want for this challenge and concluding that I've got a lot of interconnected problems that may require some relatively drastic solutions. I'm tempted toward drastic changes now for the first time in a long time, not because my life is particularly bad right now but because I feel a pretty profound sense of disconnect between where I am now and where I want to be in terms of my health and personal development.

The good news is, moving on from my situation doesn't really require any sudden dramatic shifts. Slow and steady and consistent change suits my temperament better, and I can get after it.

Having got the heavy movement (my strength and conditioning) dialed in for the most part, it's time for me to turn to two other kinds of movement: daily movement, or Mobility, and martial arts, or Play. These will be my goals for this challenge.

Goal 1: Mobility

I don't like how sedentary I've become. It's bad for my waistline and for my mind, and I need to set a boundary for myself here to get up and move. The standard of 7,500 steps is a little too drastic right now for me to take, not because that much walking is hard but because that much walking is long. There is one way to get that many steps a day though in a relatively short amount of time: the Dreaded Running. Which I'm not convinced is a good short term idea to just jump into, but I think in the long run would actually be very beneficial for me. That's probably more Epic Goal than anything, but the first step (hah!) toward that is carving time out of my day to get away from the job and move. So, goal is to get a half hour every day of walking. That's it.

Goal 2: Play

You ever have friends who were your enemies? I'm kind of there now. I have a lot of wonderful friends whom I love very much and whose lives I want very much to be a part of, but they're getting in the way of my mat time and so I'm becoming less and less the person I want to be in order to be more and more the person I think they want.

There is a solution to this, and it's one I've been holding off on because I don't think I'm worthy of it, but avoiding it isn't making me more worthy of it, so I'm just going to have to do it, and that's this: I need to make a point of doing noontime classes for martial arts whenever I can. The one day I've been doing it consistently, it's been good for me because I get to honor both my obligations to myself and to others. I need to do that more.

Along with that,

Goal 3: Study

Dedicated study of what I learn. Detailed notes on the things I'm taught so that I can keep engaging with what I'm learning and internalize it better.

And... yeah. That's that for now.

1 hour ago, Maggie-Miau said:

I made soup today. It's just a simple cabbage soup with some onion and garlic, but i heated some frozen pierogis to have with it and it's pretty good. 

Sounds like food from the Old Country. This will definitely make you Strong Like Bull, so as to get you through the bull.

1 hour ago, Sovalis said:

I wasn’t as thrilled about doing my workout today as I could have been, but I was resolute. It went pretty well. I ended up doing the planks from my knees and elbows because I can’t do them from my toes yet. It was still work, but perhaps not as much work as it could be? I might not be engaging my core enough. I always feel weird about the “engage your core” advice because I have a lot of fat on my belly and even when I am clenching hard it doesn’t feel like much is changing.

Hey, awesome for showing up despite not being thrilled. That kind of discipline isn't as fun as delight, but it's better and you'll get more out of your training in the long run if you do that, so, awesome.

As far as core engagement, I'm not sure what you're doing to engage but I know that for me that means to brace my stomach like I'm gonna take a punch, and then to "breathe behind the shield," which means deep lung breaths as opposed to belly breathing. Assuming you're doing that, if you want to make the plank harder, there are 4 options:

1. Work on full body tension. Basically, when you're down in plank, clench your everything from the top of your head to the tips of your toes. You should only be able to hold this for about 10 seconds.
2. Lengthen your lever arms. Which means that instead of having your arms under your shoulders, you start to place your arms out in front of your body. A good method, but can be hard on the lower back if you're not strong enough for it yet.
3. Add time. The most obvious and least complicated difficulty modifier, but also the most inconvenient and the least fun.
4. Change your elevation. You can have your knees placed off the ground, which will change the challenge some. This especially gets hard when you're on your feet and you plant your feet on the wall, and you have to keep tension throughout your body to keep the feet from slipping down. You can also practice "Up-Downs," where you transfer from elbows to hands and back down again. It's not quite a push-up, but it's kind of in the same neighborhood?

Whatever you decide to do, if you want to do any of these or something else entirely, make sure to be cautious and take your time. You should walk away from these workouts feeling about as good or better than when you started.

1 hour ago, Sovalis said:

Anyone know if I am doing less core work if I do them from my elbows with the forearms on the floor?

Shouldn't be less. I've generally seen elbow planks used as a progression up from hand planks; I don't really know for sure anymore which is harder, but that's probably as good a sign as any that you're not doing less work lower to the ground.

Here for walking and calisthenics, because I think that's where I'm bound. Can't wait to see how this goes for you!

Also, holy cow, just a year? I thought you were just one of those folks I hadn't kept up with for a while. Very cool! Congrats on the year!

Nice! I notice that the exercise goal has a 1 mana/minute reward. Have you considered maybe taking extra mana from exercise if that should come up?

20 hours ago, TimovieMan said:

Any chance of making it known how bad the training department really is? Or would that backfire there?

I mean, I don't think there's much chance. My impression is that the low quality of our training department is an open secret, and it's been so ever since I got here. I think it's just something we tolerate/accept on account of institutional inertia, and if I tried to point it out, it'd backfire: the department would point to a bunch of external factors to explain why we lose trainees, and then I'd be under scrutiny because I was the one who spoke up. Of course, I have nothing to hide, and I kind of relish the opportunity to speak my mind to these people, but it won't change anything and it's just as likely to get me suspended without pay as it is anything else.

21 hours ago, Sovalis said:

Good wrap up, Kishi. I am sorry work is taking advantage. Good on you for doing the right thing by the trainees, and I am sorry that you are going to have to swap your schedule and everything to do it. It speaks highly of your character. 

Thank you. Yeah, like I told my folks last night: it's a chance for me to be the kind of person I needed all those years ago.

And so the challenge is over.

So now that it's over, what do I think of it?

Overall, I think this was a good challenge to me. I changed my training and customized it more for me and my situation, and I'm feeling a lot better as a result. My writing is going well. My meditation isn't as good as it could be, but that's not to say it was bad. I definitely benefited from what practice I have.

And that's all I think about last challenge. Sometimes, it's just that simple, and a challenge is what it is. I think if there's one insight or thing I learned, it's that I don't need someone outside of myself to make a program for me that causes me to flourish. I just need resources and research, and I've got those in spades. At this point, I'm down to minor tweaks going forward, but I feel really accomplished and optimistic about what this training is going to look like going forward.

There are a couple things I need to address, though:

1. I haven't been keeping up with my mat studies as much as I could be. I keep telling myself that I'm going to go back and find and research and review things later, and that keeps not happening, and compared to prior practices I think I'm "allowing the perfect to be the enemy of the good." I think next challenge needs a research-based goal of some sort. I know I've done well before when I made a point of doing some kind of research and review every day and didn't try to keep up with specifics, and that was more benefit than what I'm getting now. Need to ruminate on this but I think I got an idea about what to do next time.
2. My bodyfat percentage is not good. I've been hovering around 29% for a while now, and I don't like how that makes me feel. It's a combination of social conditioning, personal insecurity, and paranoia with regard to my health, and I don't like it. I'm convinced that my hypothyroidism plays into that some, but I don't really know what that means; like, do I have to starve myself before I can get the body fat to burn? Do I have to walk more? Or is it just stress-related inflammation and retention, meaning I need to meditate more? I don't really know. I think I want to go back to taking long walks and eventually to even make a return to rucking, but there's some short-term stuff I gotta deal with in the meantime that's going to make that hard, so I really want to sit and think about this before I commit to something that won't work for me.
3. I've made progress in terms of my bedtime. I want to make more progress. That is all.

The short term complication that I reference in point 2 is that I was voluntold for a mentorship position at the job. Both the boss and I thought it would be helping troubled employees, and it made sense to me since 1) I've benefited from that in the past, and 2) I managed to work my caseload from about 277 cases down to ~110 all on my own and even as I was being assigned new cases. So we both thought I had something worth teaching. Thing is, it's turned out that the mentorship is for new employees, and our training dept is basically asking us to take over their training for the next 3 weeks.

That is not what I signed up for, and I'm kind of resentful of the bait and switch. It doesn't help any that our training dept is basically a bunch of glorified babysitters who teach the worst possible way to do this job. They've given us a bunch of practices that they want us to demonstrate to the trainees. Sadly for the training department, they have framed their desires as "suggestions," so I have every intention of acknowledging those suggestions and then showing my mentee how to actually do this job. This is an opportunity for me to be the person I would have needed way back at the beginning and to save someone a lot of headaches and stress in the long run. I'm kind of looking forward to it.

Only downside is, I've basically got to be at the office every day for the next three weeks. Boooooooo. The training department claims that we can keep up remote working and successful mentor these people. To which I say, go fuck yourself, Training Department. A trainee can't shadow a mentor that isn't there and there's all kinds of learning this job that can only happen in-person. If this is indicative of the attitude they take toward training, then it's no wonder our turnover for new trainees is 70%.

I will be better to my trainee than they were to me. But I resent the effort.

Oh well.

My thanks to all and everyone who has stopped by and reacted or commented on my shenanigans here. Special thanks to @Sovalis, @Scaly Freak, @Tanktimus the Encourager, @The Most Loathed, @TimovieMan, @Everstorm, @Mistr, @KB Girl, @Machete, @Jupiter, @juliebarkley, and anyone I missed on the way. I know it didn't seem like it this time, but I do care about this community and y'all being around really made a positive difference for me. I'm sorry that I have been a stranger to most of you this time. I know this happens from time to time, but I'm never happy with myself when I let that happen. I will work to be a better support to you going forward. At least in the short term.

I thank you all, and I will see you next round.

Ninja!

Yes, you all thought that I'd vanished, when, in reality, I... no, actually, I totally just peaced out for a bit.

Didn't mean to at first. 2 weeks ago marked the start of a jump in my workload, and after I calculated how much more I'd have to do to keep up with it, that became my focus, even to the point of working tons of overtime. And whatever time I wasn't spending on work I was spending on the mats or writing or meditating. I tried to keep track of everything, but it eventually hit a point where it was just easier for me to focus on myself instead of my responsibilities here, and so that's what I did.

Fortunately, I trust y'all to be awesome without me, and you don't need me here to henpeck you with positivity. I trust you have been well in my absence.

Anyway, the challenge still happened even without my tracking it. Training has changed some; these days I'm following a 5-day microcycle routine where on days 1 and 3, I do my kettlebell work, and on days 2 and 4, I do the bodyweight stuff I picked up in Overcoming Gravity, which works out to a day for dips and a day for inverted rows. Day 5 of these is a rest day, which I take just about completely off from everything for the sake of my joints.

Speaking of those, I'm pleased to report that my elbow's doing a lot better. I've recently got into rice bucket work - sticking my fist down into a bucket of rice and rolling my wrist against the resistance. It feels good, man. Also, the inverted rows are being done as pure eccentric work, meaning I just lower down from the start position instead of going down and up. My elbow loves this kind of work. As to my shoulder, well, it's intermittently angry at me and I don't know why. I think I probably jumped back onto the mats too soon and I haven't set my boundaries properly as far as asking people to roll nicely with me. Fortunately, I've started up on prehab exercises again and that seems to make a pretty significant difference.

I've also started doing qigong consistently in the mornings, usually on kettlebell days and my days off. My body thanks me for this too.

I'm also pleased to report that my writing has made significant progress on the Snowflake Method. Right now I'm at the synopsis phase of development. I've had to go back and forth in terms of doing some re-writes, but identifying that stuff now versus later when I'm in the trenches of the prose is incredibly useful to the development of the story.

Meditation's been happening too, but it's not as much as I'd like, and while I don't know the exact numbers off the top of my head, I do know it's not as good as I'd like it to be. That's regrettable, although my 10 Breaths to Sleep has continued, and I feel some benefit from it, so that whole thing isn't as bad as it could be.

I've got some thoughts about where I want to go from here, but I think that's for a wrap-up, and this is the last day of the challenge, so I'm going to hold off on that. Instead, I'm off to write, go for a walk, and lift heavy things, because I basically outpaced my job in a lot of ways and I can't work overtime until they catch up. (of course, they have other ways of giving me OT work, but after 2 weeks of pedal to the metal, man, I need some space and time, so don't nobody go telling my bosses that I'm further ahead than they can handle, mmmkay?)

I'll be around to you all as I can. I hope you've been well. ❤️

So out of curiosity, I went looking for photos of Latvian food and now I'm hungry.

Dunno if it's my inner Polish talking or what, but I reckon you're gonna be okay on food, once the culture shock wears off.

Goal 1: 18/19

Goal 2: 16/19

Goal 3: 9/19

Well, this week has been a write off for mat time.

Wednesday I didn't hit the work quotas I needed to make mat time a good idea. I had to work OT instead to make up. Thursday, my writing friend decided that she wanted to get together, so that happened instead of martial arts. I have a feeling that I may have miscalculated in terms of whether or not my Thursday nights are free, given that my writing friend's life is starting to settle down and she's really dedicated to making this friendship work. Which is really cool of her. But it also means no training last night. And I can't really bank on that time for training going forward.

I thought I'd try to make it out today but traffic was absolutely a nightmare and I didn't leave the apartment in time. Which I didn't know I was doing at that time, so I was in traffic when it became clear I wouldn't be able to make it. That was deeply frustrating.

And I'm not going to make it out tomorrow either, since friends want to get together and I got outvoted on what time works best.

I guess my social life and my martial arts life at least have this much in common: there's no off season.

It's frustrating. But it's been a frustrating week. Change has happened at a time that I really didn't want it to, but it's down to things I had no say in, and that's just how life is sometimes. I don't control my feelings, so they're going to rage and run as they do, but that fuel will be spent in time and when I'm on the other side of it, I'm going to have to recalculate how I get after my mat time.

One major possibility going forward is a return to open mats. I've been avoiding them until I got clearance from my ortho, and now that I have that, it's about time to go back. The only hold up is that I'm waiting for my teeth to finish resetting, at which point I can remold my mouthguard in a more permanent way and go roll in a freer way without having to worry about amateur orthodontistry.  So, that'll be in about 3 weeks. I owe it to myself in the meantime to make the most of my time such as it is. That should mean note-taking and study, but the OT, good as it is for my paycheck, has really interfered with that. The fact that I've been staying up later as a result to get some personal time for myself afterward isn't helping that any either.

Things aren't going the way I want them to right now. But that doesn't mean they always will. There's a better way to comport myself now, and I know it. So best to be about it.

Lifting, writing, and meditation on the docket. Let's get it done.

14 hours ago, Mistr said:

Dumbledore is now the proud owner of a 2015 Kia with 25,000 miles. We know it really was owned by a little old lady who just drove to the grocery store once a week and to get the New York Times on Sundays. It seems to be in good shape. Tomorrow we will get the oil changed before starting the 20 hour drive home.

Nice! I drive a 2012 Kia myself; even with ~6.5 times the mileage, it still drives well. Good stuff, glad to hear.

14 hours ago, Mistr said:

Happily, I can report that the oatmilk ice cream bars with chocolate coating and crispies are even better than similar Haagen-Das bars.

I believe it! I've also gotten into Ben and Jerry's non-dairy options; their Bananas Foster pints are proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

13 hours ago, Scaly Freak said:

I'm also, based on how much the extra meditation helped, thinking that I need to increase the amount of time set aside for meditation. I typically do 10-20 minutes. I may need to set 15 or 20 as the minimum and aim higher, until chaos no longer reigns.

Mm. More time is good. I would advise, though, that if you can't make that time initially that you don't stop doing what you can do. I say this as someone who's done just that.

So, knowing now that that room is just a room for various musicians to be in (if the last music from there was anything to go on)... I think I wanna be in that room. Just get a good vibe off of it, you know?

On 4/9/2023 at 11:54 PM, juliebarkley said:

Tortillas ... are ... dairy??

They're in Wisconsin; everything is dairy up there.

Goal 1: 16/17

Goal 2: 15/17

Goal 3: 9/17

Uf. What day is it? Oh, buddy. Better get this caught up. It's been a busy enough throuple of days that I've decided to break up how I tell this in a non-chronological way.

OK, so, uh, Sunday was Easter. Mom didn't feel like cooking, so we went out to eat. Brother was along this time, which was a pleasant surprise. We thought maybe this would be the last time we saw him, as he's planning to move out of state, but it looks like he's gonna be around until sometime next month. There's a chance I'll be driving out with him to make sure he arrives safely as well as to help him get situated, which, gotta be frank, I have no idea how I'm going to make that work, but that's never stopped me before!

After lunch, he took off, and I hung around with the folks as per the usual Sunday thing before headed back home.

Monday was Sci Fi night. Couldn't get everyone together for the game we need to finish, so we wound up watching Chernobyl instead, Craig Mazin's first project which basically gave him the clearance to get Last of Us made. It's a rewatch for me. Very, very good. I can see how people wanted to work with him after he was done.

Tuesday was a day at the office. Got the word from on high that I'm getting more cases starting next week. Of course, they aren't bumping my pay for it, and given that's on top of the paycut coming from our legislature (which wants to give us raises and adjustments, but the raises and adjustments don't match the consumer price index or the rate of inflation) the end result is less money for more work. The old anger is stirring again. Good. I was wondering where it'd gone.

Had a couple dr's appts on Monday and Tuesday. Monday was the dentist, where I achieved the epic goal of not bleeding during or after an exam. Floss before you brush, kids. That's the trick. Tuesday I got to the orthopedist and was told that I'd healed as much as I was going to and that I was cleared for return to full sparring. Of course, gotta ease into this, but I'll get there. Looks like I'm back, although it looks like it's on me to prehab this thing and make sure it stays good. I prefer to think it could get better yet, but it's probably beyond whatever the orthopedist can do right now short of surgery or something.

As far as the goals go, I've changed some things up as I'm wont to do. Although not for the reasons you might expect. I've basically lost access to GB's stuff through some kind of error on their site and when I reached out to them to see what I needed to do to fix it, they didn't respond back. So now I no longer have access to their progression schemes or anything like that, and while in the short term that would be fine, in the long term I would have stalled out without any real idea of where to go from where I'd have landed. Also, I'm not sure I want to use a product from a team/company that doesn't value my business.

So I started puttering about and wound up getting a copy of Steven Low's Overcoming Gravity, which was a big hit here in the Rebellion some years ago. He'd released a 2nd edition since then with all kinds of useful information, enough for me to actually be overwhelmed by the options and flexibility, which was something I didn't expect. I wound up reaching out to their community and got a lot of good advice, even hearing from the author himself which was unexpected and very nice of him to do. And after all that, and based on his recommendations, I'm actually cutting back a lot on what I was doing before and just focusing on dips and pull ups in addition to the kettlebell swings and get ups. And that only one or two times a week. I'm working on putting all that together and I'll be starting up the new stuff tomorrow, but, uh, yeah. Should be fun, I think.

And that brings me to today, where I'm working to get everything done and hopefully get out on time to make it to the mats. We'll see how it shakes out. Fingers crossed!

26 minutes ago, Machete said:

 

Haha, being minimalist, or constantly moving?

Being a minimalist. I like where I am for now, but being a minimalist would help if that changed.

On 4/6/2023 at 5:45 PM, Mistr said:

Yep, I am working on that. Dumbledore still drinks regular milk some of the time, even though he has known for years that dairy gives him problems. At least Elf, Cleo and I have shifted completely to oat milk and almond milk.

I can relate to this. I don't really drink my dairy anymore, but I'll still eat it. Generally in its fermented forms, although sometimes I'll make room for ice cream such as the situation warrants.

But yeah, the craziest part is how little I miss milk. I've had the obligation to finish off the odd quart here or there after having bought it for recipes, and I'm surprised at how little I care for it. So, there's something to the avoidance, I think.

On 4/3/2023 at 1:20 PM, Machete said:

I might be moving this month or next. Who knows? Stay mobile, travel light. Gruntstyle.

Feeling this one in my soul these days. It's something that I aspire to rather than something I accomplish.

Welcome back as always. And hey, if you need help or anything, feel free to DM me and I'll see what I can work out.

On 4/6/2023 at 4:46 PM, Mistr said:

I think you are smart to go back to some of the intermediate steps in the progression until your leg stops protesting. Maybe a month beyond that as well.

Yeah, I think you're right. Although I don't know how much more time I'll need to recover. Even if I was doing this at a relatively fast pace per GB's programming, I'd still be paying my dues at these deck squats for about 2.5 months. Doing it in my slower way bumps that up to probably 5 months or so. Maybe more than that, depending on how I want to approach the problem of going from elevated to non-elevated deck squatting.

On 4/6/2023 at 4:46 PM, Mistr said:

I would put my money on you accidentally pulling something while you were sparring in BJJ. You were concentrating on your moves and your partner, so you might not have even felt a twinge. Later it had time to stiffen up and get your attention.

That might be a good bet. I for the life of me can't tell where or when it happened if it happened before the strength work on Wednesday, but I can tell you that it was talking to me when I went out to the mats on Thursday night. Kind of surprised me, actually.

On 4/6/2023 at 7:37 PM, Scaly Freak said:

 

Thank you for reminding me that I forgot to mediate in the unstructured habit-free chaos that was my morning.

No worries! I'm here to help.

*

Goal 1: 13/13

Goal 2: 12/13

Goal 3: 7/13

Wound up being a mat-time kind of Thursday. Which is fine with me. Don't get me wrong, I like writing with my friend when she can make it out, but I like my mat time too. In case you couldn't tell.

Prior to that was strength work. I did elevated push ups and hollow body tuck holds per GB's protocol... and I worked some elevated deck squats in, just to test. Because I have a squat-shaped hole in my soul, and the only way to fill it is to work my legs. I'm pleased to report that they were easy, although there's still technical stuff for me to watch and work on there; even though my feet stay planted, my knees have a tendency to track outward and I think that might be a sign/symptom of some kind of movement deficit. Totally correctable, no pain when done proper, and that tendon wasn't angry at me either doing this or doing the mobility work afterward, which tells me this is where I need to be right now. Still notable, though.

BJJ was focused on takedown to mount and then running a mount series. All very simple but very effective stuff. No complaints from me. Can't spell fundamentals without "fun" and all that. Rolls as follows:

1. 2-stripe White: my partner for class. I forgot my survival posture for mount and so I wound up giving up an armbar, I think? Switched positions, went on the attack, and couldn't get the crosscollar choke I wanted, but I couldn't force the Americana off of there either, so I wound up attacking and getting a modified Ezekiel choke, which I haven't hit in a while. Taught my partner about it, then we switched and he hit it on me. What a good teacher I am.
2. 1-stripe White: started off being mounted and remembered my survival posture! He couldn't really do anything with it and somehow or other I recall recovering to guard. Probably what happened is that my survival posture got me in position to achieve a half-guard and I was able to brute-force a guard from there, because that's typically how it works out for me if I can make the recovery. This is how I learned that the tendon doesn't like guard very much, although it didn't hurt so much as it was just not comfy. Since it was considered a successful defense, we switched roles. Got in mount and hit modified Ezekiel again. I forgot how much fun that is.
3. 2-stripe White: ah, now this is the roll I'm the most proud of. We were given permission to freeroll, but we had to "pick somebody cool and roshambo for starting positions." I lost and he elected to start with mount. Start the round and I go for survival posture: rolling onto my side for breathing room, one hand up by my neck, and the other buried under my body so that they can't do anything with it. He goes to attack the under arm and discovers he can't do anything with it, so he grabs my free hand for gift wrap and tries to pull me into a back take. I immediately scoot my butt out so that he can't get hooks in. We squabble over arms for a while before he gets a leg up and goes for armbar. I lock that down, getting leverage under his leg and pushing it open so I can get up into the space. It's too tight for me to try to pop that space open, so I Over-Under him and manage to sprawl out in side control. He tries to recover and can't. I go to attack Americana, but that doesn't work; I try to track the arm as he straightens it out, but it doesn't feel like it's going to work, so I transition to scarf hold. Bell goes off just as I get there.

That last roll is the one I'm most proud of, because I've come to understand the survival postures from that position enough to predict what people will do in those situations, and to influence them into making certain decisions that I can capitalize on, sometimes. Doesn't always carry off with colored belts; they have a tendency to force situations on me instead and also they get around a lot of my survival postures, but that's to be expected for where we are in the journey.

Came back home, ate dinner and went to bed.

And man, I dunno what to tell you about Friday except that I must have a sleep deficit that needed to be made up. We had a cold snap down here - temps went from 80 and sunny to 47 and rainy - and I pretty much just hibernated all day. When I finally did wake up, it was late afternoon. I decided to honor my body and just take it easy the rest of the day, which seems to have paid off some today - leg feels no pain at all and even though I slept late again, it was along more normal lines and I woke up and shook off my drowsiness much faster than I normally do.

No rolling the past couple of days as a result, and I'm wondering now if, given @Mistr's insight into my situation, if maybe what I need to be doing is less mat time and more study time. I've noticed lately that my elbow doesn't really like the sparring very much, and while it doesn't hurt like it used to, it feels like it's kind of at a sticking point in terms of its recovery. I do have plenty of notes and study to undertake. I dunno if I'm formally committed yet to the idea of intentional time off, but the past couple days of hard rest has made me thoughtful. My body generally doesn't push for that kind of thing unless I've really been failing to pay my dues somewhere, and that could be part of it.

I dunno. Just thoughtful, lately. Anyway, today is today. I've got a lot of energy, so I'm going to get stuff done. But I feel like there are some lessons in the past few days for me to consider and do something with. Dunno what just yet. We will see.

Goal 1: 11/11

Goal 2: 10/11

Goal 3: 6/11

So, I wasn't able to get to the mats. Didn't finish the job on time to get to striking, and with my clothes needing to be washed I couldn't make it to no-gi either. So no mat time. Boo.

Did do strength work. A surprising mixed bag. I found that my elbow responded really well to a closed grip on the rings during my inverted rows, and also I was able to go from a pronated grip through neutral to a fully supinated grip at the top of the rep (so, going from palms facing out at the bottom to palms facing me at the top). Wild stuff, y'all. I didn't see it coming, and I'm not sure why that happened. Wild guess at this point is that closing the grip took some pressure off my pinky finger, which is the tendon that's feeding into the inflamed part of my elbow and lets it relax a bit. Combined with slow, intentional cadence, I'm maintaining my form without compensating through there. It's something to watch and be mindful of; I kind of expect that it's going to switch up a little next week and I'm going to have to be paying attention to it when it happens. Very interesting.

Leg work on the other hand took a weird turn. Got a sudden burning pain on the outside of my right leg out of nowhere. No pops, no noises, no indications, just a sudden mild stabbing discomfort that made me think of the color red. I aborted the session at that point. I tried my scheduled core work but my leg didn't like it, so I stopped. Good news is, it responds to stretching, but holy crap did it feel tight when I went to do it.

That's got me thoughtful. For those who might not remember, I skipped a couple steps on the progression to pistol squatting. GB wants me to go from full squatting to elevated deck squats to full deck squats and then to cossack squats, like I was doing. I'm not convinced I need deck squats in order to get to pistols, but something I didn't think about is that GB wants its trainees to do specific integrated mobility drills to build and rebuild the tendons and ligaments to support such movements. In skipping the big stuff, I skipped the small stuff too, and I could tell that I didn't really have the strength to do the integrated mobility for the cossacks. But I thought I could make do. I'm wondering now if I was wrong.

The whole reason I'm reticent about deck squatting is that the method they want me to use involves equipment that I don't have and don't really have the space for. I'm lucky enough to have a deck out back of my place that I can use for the elevated deck squats, but it's a straight drop from there down to the floor for the next progression as opposed to the use of mats to gradually roll down on the ground.

But maybe that's a silly thing to be worried about. After all, I'm doing the slowest possible progression and realistically if I went back to elevated deck squatting and spent my time paying my dues, the problem of height doesn't become relevant until, like, 9-18 weeks from the date I start. Surely I can clean up enough space to make the mats a good idea.

Huh. Okay.

Writing happened at least. Meditation did not, since I had to get to bed early for a dr's appt this morning. Which brings us to today. Strength work on the docket and either mat time or writing time with friend. Got tomorrow off, so mat time's a given.

Goal 1: 10/10

Goal 2: 9/10

Goal 3: 6/10

Tuesday was a very productive day. I finished my job stuff early and instead of going on a walk found myself drawn to my writing. So I decided to honor that and focus on that. I've made a couple cuts to my cast of characters and added the main antagonist; once he's done, my cast should be in working shape and I'll move on to my next step.

Mat time was more scarf hold, which was expected. Tuesday night fundamental classes tend to get a refined version of the Monday fundamentals. Unlike Monday, though, we actually worked on attacks and transitions, which was a welcome change of pace. Only a couple of rolls last night:

• ???-stripe white belt: can't remember his stripes. Started from side control. I managed the transition to scarf hold and landed an armbar on him. When we switched positions, he got a hold of my elbow in scarf hold and did not let go, but he wasn't able to do anything with the position so he went for mount. I was able to reverse the mount and get "Trap-trap-and roll," which I can't recall the last time I hit that in sparring. Changed positions again and went for scarf hold again. This time he was almost able to escape but I was able to hold it through the end of the roll.
• 2-stripe white belt: started off in his guard. We squabbled some for a bit before I was able to achieve base. Went to knee slide, but he got knee shield up in response and shot for triangle. It landed very badly, and I was able to manage some kind of an Over-Under pass, shucking his legs to the side and landing in side control. We reset and switched roles. He was able to stand up and break my guard open. Tried to go for double ankle sweep, but he stepped out of it, so I switched my legs and got one foot on his hip and the other under his far knee and managed a Tripod sweep. Couldn't establish control off of it, though, but I'll take it.

Got back home, did some qigong and meditation and... just chilled. It was a good night, although I did drop the ball and forgot to get my stuff washed last night. Since we wear belts in no-gi, and since my belt is not clean, I'll be skipping out of that tonight. I do mean to make striking, though, although the job today has been unusually hairy, so it's not guaranteed.

17 hours ago, Scaly Freak said:

 

Could this have to do with boundaries...? Specifically yours, and SciFi friend not respecting them?

More a sense of general disrespect rather than a particular matter of boundaries. Without getting into details, he's had a couple of isolated instances of saying/doing things that I would think he would know better than to do if he really valued my company.

But these are isolated things, and I know that he's got a pretty profoundly stressful situation going on right now. I know if I was in his position, I wouldn't necessarily be as kind as I'd want to be either, and I wouldn't want to be defined by my shortcomings, especially if I'd worked as hard to facilitate this relationship as he has.

Besides, the current kickboxing coach doesn't really have anything to teach me that I can't learn and study for myself. The value of the program is the sparring, and my attendance wouldn't have been affected by taking Monday night off the mats.

*

Goal 1: 9/9

Goal 2: 8/9

Goal 3: 5/9

Monday down! Was able to leverage my new hourlong lunch into noontime BJJ class where we went over more ways to deal with scarf hold. Sigh. Coach. Stop, man.

But I got that done and made it back home to get some work done and then lift heavy things per my schedule. Then went out to see the new D&D film, Honor Among Thieves. And, yo, this movie's actually good. Which is a huge thing to say given the history of D&D films. It's a fun film with a good balance between gravitas and levity. You could accuse it of being a little rote, painting by the numbers to get done what it wants to get done, but it's got enough charm to pull it off. I found it to be very enjoyable.

Got back and got some writing done, but I didn't really manage meditation in any appreciable degree. Did take 10 breaths before going to sleep, though.

Today is today. Finished my job stuff early and felt drawn to my writing, so I honored that. Still need to train and meditate, which I'd be surprised with myself if I don't accomplish.

Goal 1: 8/8

Goal 2: 7/8

Goal 3: 5/8

Got everything done yesterday! A quiet Sunday. It was nice to be social and have a day to just rest and meander without any kind of intentional training. Kind of weird, if I'm being frank.

But yeah, nothing done means nothing to report.

Today is today. S&S and BJJ on the docket. Sci Fi friend initially said he was taking the night off of hosting duties because of the situation with his mom but then said he wanted to get together to see the D&D movie, and I wanted to see it too and I know I won't take the opportunity to do so unless someone invites me to do it, so guess I'm doing that tonight instead of kickboxing. I'm... kind of mad about it? Dunno if it's just my normal saltiness about making plans and having them be changed by my priorities and external circumstances or if it's something more. I have to admit that a sense of grievance has been developing in me lately toward my friend, and I'm working to understand it and let it run its course into background noise; this is just a data point for me to understand.

Anyway. Time to be simple on my way to being sinister.