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Sorry I'm catching up quite late but those were great comments. I hope it helps with the low self-esteem in that area (if you don't fall yourself off the impostor syndrome cliff). But factually to me it sounds like great feedback especially knowing that you have been struggling pretty hard on that side. I just wanted to say that I relate to that to some extent. Not that I'm the lazy type, not really. Sometimes, but nothing aggravating. But I do like to control stuff to some extent, so too many things in the pipe would make me quite anxious For me, nope.

Ha ha 😅 Thanks for pointing it out, I'm sorry I totally missed it! Happy super belated birthday Raptron! ♥️

I will send you a picture when I get it it's not a competition one. I'm planning to do Turkish get-ups kidding I downloaded a KB app with a variety of moves. Squat / deadlift / press / rows / core stuff. I'm curious about the swing, I'm planning to follow this progression: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYHbu2LRqD0 It will likely be low key discovery for a while to be honest. I don't have a sudden urge to get into KB sport as such. It's more like I need some iron and a KB seems like a cool tool Hiya! No I don't think so. Maybe at some point though I will just post in this battle log for a while. Kirsty and Gayle HS community is quite busy, lots of material and feedback that I need to digest and apply, take a video, run it by the coaches and so on. It is quite time consuming actually. I'm going to try to find a rhythm and see.

ha ha no 1-arm yet! I'm on a plateau right now, a real plateau, not a 2-day one Press to HS is still more or less the same, sometimes I'll get 1 or 2 reps from standing but not consistently. It has been that way for a year. The only progress is that I don't need to warmup from as high as before. I'll take it.... With HSPUs, it seems I have a bit of a clumsy shoulder movement in retraction (I elevate the scapulae instead of keeping them depressed and using a lot more traps than I should). I'm struggling to make progress in bent arms and I have returned to the very basics because it has caused me some pain. So mostly pushups, band work and lots of scapular basic movements. Not exactly super exciting but I want to keep healthy shoulders. And right now I'm working on my hips to progress on flags. I'm doing some block work these days as well (just balancing, no fancy stuff). And some ball and puppet HS when I feel like it. Aerial is on stand by because of Covid. I do train a little at home but I think I lost the passion really. I will probably not book the course next year. And I got a 10kg KB that I'm planning to use, well to learn KB basics, and hopefully help a bit with my shoulder-movement-funk situation. So anyway, happy new Gregorian year 2020 has been pretty awful... I'm still kinda meh-ed about it, to put it lightly. My father has recovered from his operation (prostate cancer). His blood analyses are much much better but still a wee bit over the red line. He will do another test in a month or so to check in what direction this is going. E and I are hoping Trump doesn't blast Iran just before he leaves... Apart from that... Touching wood... I went back to a bit of drawing during the holiday. I took a 10 euros course on Domestika It was nice actually and relaxing. I treated myself to an expensive set of Rotring isograph pens but they were really worth the investment. I have used fineliners before but this is clearly a different game. The flow is great even on acrylics. And the ink stays black. I also got white ink which really made it easier for highlights and stuff. Anyway it has kept me busy during the holidays. I made a project page on Domestika, I think it should be public. Nothing fancy, and some mistakes in shapes and all that but I enjoyed doing it and getting my hands dirty. I has been a while since I drew a little cartoon. Let's see if I can keep at it when work starts again (Monday). And voilà for an update

10kgs, I hesitated between 8 and 10 because I'm a beginner. And after looking up what to watch for when buying a KBs + the price range, I went for a model that only had a 10kg one available.

Happy New Year dear Guild Leader So happy to read you can access gymnastics practice again!

Happy New Year!!

Hey happy New Year dear Mad Hatter, whatever day you like it to be he he this is so you I don't think I have a "thing". I see people who do and it's amazing to see (the dedication, the clarity of path, the progress and so on). But I don't have that really. I mean I get into things I like (aerial, handstands, drawings...) and I've kept a fairly advanced level of nerdiness when coding. But it goes by waves really. Art in particular. It comes and go. I get super absorbed for a while and then it dwindles away. I'll pick it up again and get absorbed again. I don't feel I really excel at one thing. I'm quite good in a few areas (that change over time lol), and I learn relatively quickly but up to a threshold and then I get bored or maybe a bit annoyed because I see the excellence level and whatever plateau I am at, and there is such a gap. So mhm. But well. I rationalize it as being a bridge / interdisciplinary person. I have my uses and purposes I guess, all in plural I sure hope I can see again more of your art, and pole and handstand videos, and the hobbit walks too

Happy New Year! I read in diagonal that you got the THING!! 😳 but recovered well apparently! Glad it was fairly mild! I don't know what when through my mind but I ordered a KB 🙃 I haven't received it yet. But let's see, you made me curious. He he he

Thank you very much ❤️ I think I got that from the aerial community back in Scotland. We'd have creative classes and regular little shows. All this was made accessible from early levels and it was a great factor of progress and motivation. Because it was so much fun and it was a safe atmosphere as well, so you would get quickly over that adult thing of feeling "silly", and "not looking good". Last Saturday, when I was practicing, E. came about and asked: "Are you playing?" not are you busy with your handstand session, your workout etc. And I really liked it. Yes it's my play time One neighbour also called my training room the play room (initially they thought we had a kid, there are big windows giving onto the courtyard so you can see the aerial rig, balls, puppets, bands, blocks lying around...), and I guess my cat knows it as well because that's where she always brings / searches for her toys ha ha Here are a few links that I found inspiring in handstands: And I like her as well: https://www.instagram.com/jattaborg/ I hope I can see one of her shows one day because she is actually in France! (She is Finnish). I'm sure there are many others but they get hidden by the overwhelming amount of drill / technical posts.

This somehow made me jump a little. Like a physical reaction first. Then I thought I hope death isn't a failure either because we are all doomed (or are there winning vs loosing deaths?). But I think I see what you mean in this specific context of feeling deep despair and possibly eying up quick endings / not having much hope. Mad Hatter, I do like hanging out on your threads as well NF challenges can be great to get a boost or a reminder of what you need to work on, or to test stuff. It's a tool but that's it. There are things or times when there is no point getting further challenged really. Do you feel more mental fatigue or physical fatigue or both?

What's up Hatter?

Awesome progress! Well done!

Oh my, that's so exciting! A garden is pretty cool! And it's just so much nicer to have space for home practice. And that handstand pirouette was brilliant!

It's the Rangers forum, they have a special talent for that Happy belated Thanks Giving!

Fantastic princess story!

Cheers! yes I just caught up with your thread and I loved your leg waves! Working on those a little bit made realize how much it's a hip exercise rather than a leg thing. I will spend a bit more time on those but first working on activating those hips correctly and not minding the leg bending. ha ha this cracked me up It was a fun challenge overall. It was just a bit hard to get into it every single week because it's pretty intense both mentally and physically. But I enjoyed it, I'll certainly keep my Saturday for play and creativity, not necessarily in that format but still. So reviewing this challenge: oddly enough, the sessions that I thought were the most productive (in terms of ideas getting developed) were the ones outside of my comfort zone (the one with "light" in it: DAB and FLOAT). On the other hand I kinda lacked of inspiration in PRESS although I have been doing these sorts of movements for quite a while. WRING was interesting too, maybe indeed because it pushed my "strong" side a bit further. For SLASH, I had big ideas that were too hard to implement (with respect to my current skills). Whereas in DAB, I started with apprehension and worked on something small but that I could do, and that worked out in a few repeats. For FLOAT, again I did not have the skills for my initial idea, and as soon as I cut that thread, I went for the ball idea, which totally opened brand new horizons really. This was a good practice in letting something go when it does not work. Some ideas were good I think and I will keep them in a corner for when I have made enough progress with my handstand. But I'm quite happy I was able to move on instead of obsessing on the one thing I can't do. The one I liked the most was DAB, because I had a few of ideas and they almost worked straight away. Not all of them, but to be honest in those improv sessions, from my personal xp, it's not common at all to come up with material that work straight away, it usually takes a lot of repeat and practice time to get there. But on that one, I was very surprised to find that new puppet entry and the hip dab was fun. I learned a bit more about the polarities light/strong, sustained/sudden, direct/indirect and how they feel for me in handstands (spoiler: they all feel heavy ha ha ). ok joking a wee bit, I did get a whole new array of balancing sensations, with video feedback (how it looks vs what I feel). It's a bit difficult to express in words but it feels quite valuable in terms of balancing xp. Now I also found that it was hard to put movements or music in tiny little boxes as I said at some point. Sometimes I found an interesting movement thread that I wanted to follow but it did not quite fit the constraints. So I had to let that go in the context of this challenge. Now I feel free again. Still, the constraints were a good exercise because it forced me to explore things that I would not naturally explore. So, some ambivalence here. Good format to follow every so often, but not all the time basically. I had a good reminder of how "intention" is critical to movement. Eg if my intention is to extend my leg, I should extend it fully and reach the END of that extension. Otherwise it looks like unfinished business or half-arsed movement. That's what I mean by lacking intent. I have been aware of this for a while, but I still don't always apply it. What I would like to work on next: oh that ball, I'm definitely going to work a lot more with it! sustained movement. That was hard in handstand. I would rather work on that one first. Very sudden is also pretty hard. But I'd like to improve my stability in sustained first. (so maybe I also learned new vocabulary to describe balancing experiences) work on my hips (flagging, leg waves, leg splits / stags) Et voilà! Thanks for reading/watching and very much appreciated all your feedback guys

I love the pirouette you did in HS on your insta. It was so solid! I'm adding it to my wishlist

I'm just catching up now and your leg waves were so nice ❤️ Even in head stand, I'm just so clunky Super excited to see your stretching progress as well!

Congrats on the turkey! 2020 has seen me under tension a lot But you're right that I kill myself a lot more in creative/play/not-so-structured sessions, than on say press workouts. I definitely feel it

Oops I'm late but Happy birthday! Love the vid, so Assassin-y Learning to bail is a difficult one. The side bail on pbarz started to come to me about what, 6 months ago? When I started handstands, I did very little wall exercises for that very reason (the wall is also a pain with pbarz). I ended up learning free standing from day 1 and bailing in a sort of bridge on my sofa. Then on the floor. It's not something I felt like doing in chest to wall 🤕 The roll was also an option but I needed a good landing place. So all in all, I got used to bailing in a bridge. I would not particularly recommend that approach though But it's true that getting over the fear is a big milestone. Whatever works for you and is safe enough.

Very effective level up challenge! It really shows on your videos too imo!

I'm nowhere near that sort of volume really 😛 I agree with you on variety, it really helps to attack the same problem from different angles, and it's good for the mind too. Challenge has come along very nicely!

ha ha the immediate left over sensation was a bit rough but I got over it And thank you all for your kind messages!! This week was very busy in many ways, including today. But I managed to get my 5th effort done this morning. So it was FLOAT! The hard shit At first I wanted to do leg waves on “Winter” (Mum). I think it would have worked out very well for the float aspect. However I did not manage to get those leg waves at all. For those wondering about leg waves in HS, here is a sample at the end of this tutorial: https://youtu.be/4M2F0CXwM5M?t=452 (I'm not sure how to embed videos with the new layout) My straddle is not good enough for this. I'm doing something wrong with my hips (rotating instead of hinging, I need to get back to flagging practice!). And synchronization is also an issue. Even in a head stand, it's a bit smoother but still not quite IT. Here are my attempts, I still want to count them as a big effort towards this challenge It's not good at all but I'm sharing anyway, it's where I am at and I don't want to censor it, it's part of the challenge. You can see the brain is really not computing at times, I find it quite funny But I still think it would work nicely as a float on that music. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlPWSvghLu4 Anyway, so I stopped that leg-waving thread and went on to my red ball as I had recently seen Kirsty do stuff in HS with her little red ball. Some time last June I had tried to get it in HS but I hadn't managed. I wanted to check it out again. And lo and behold, this time I could! So I decided to use the ball as a proxy. I'm not a very “floaty” person, as demonstrated above. But I think I could manage to give that feeling with the ball. It's still not quite there YET but it got me really super super excited! I want to try so many other things now, like rolling the ball in seven and rotations in a straight HS. I was just too tired to let it develop in full in this session, but I will sure try again. It feels doable with practice (much more than leg waves to be honest ). I hope you can see a couple of of those ideas I had in this short sample even if it's still a bit raw: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIvK0fgcRL4 And now I have to run again. I will come around tomorrow to check everybody's thread and conclude on this challenge.

The one where the apparatus falls even before he started running really cracked me up 😂