Osu

[ReturnOfTheDad]

No problem, it's a tough road to get a profitable martial arts school going and sounds like ya'll are doing something pretty special. Happy to help out with whatever recommendations I can. 

[Kishi]

All right, let's get this up to speed.

 

Friday night we went to teach at Triangle Self Defense. It was a dead-ass class again. Friday night is the deadest night. But we got to work on some basic stuff that I hadn't got the chance to work on in a while. Always good to work on the basics.

 

Afterward, Manong and I talked and I got a fuller picture of what happened. Apparently it wasn't Manong's idea to cut us; it was J-sensei who cut us. The BJJ guy apparently went straight to J-sensei about it. And apparently the pressure is on us harder to meet our obligations in our location. Manong gave K-sensei the impression it was okay to quit paying and that happened at the same time that J-sensei was deliberating making room for BJJ, so J-sensei seems to have decided at that point to cut the Karate program, as we hadn't significantly grown in the two years we'd been there.

 

It makes some of K-sensei's Thursday comments make sense. He was talking about how he'd always preferred something smaller and how he wasn't invested in making money off the program and how he'd always had too much to do with having the fulltime job and this on top of it. I think, stepping back from it, that he and J-sensei and Manong had some very fundamental differences in terms of their vision for the place, and when this dude showed up it just caused a crack in things.

 

One other thing that apparently none of us understood was that this wasn't supposed to be sudden; we were going to have another week in the space, and apparently just up and jumping ship was K-sensei's idea, which was confirmed today.

 

Phaw. What a shitshow. But it seems that what's done is done.

 

I went to the gym afterward and angry!moved. I was pleased to discover that they have actual gymnastic mats there and I was able to roll off of them, which was pretty great. Cinching the core made everything difficult, as I wanted it to.

 

Must admit, I'm kind of vexed over what I'm doing in terms of making time for copious amounts of gentle movement. BJJ might be good for that - I've long maintained that's it's the manliest aerobic class ever, so maybe that's what I need to do? It won't be tonight, but starting next week that'll be a thing, and that might be something I need to make room for. The next trick being, then, just WTF I'm going to do to make room for all the things I want to do. Oh well. I'm never truly happy unless I'm solving problems; in fact, if I had no problems to solve, I would be complaining that things were too easy.

 

I'll have to be rethinking the program tonight. Fortunately, it's designed to support change, so I'm pretty sanguine about this, and there's something I've been itching to try for a while anyway, so perhaps it is all just as well.

 

Saturday was Kali. Got to work with someone who was more about good pressure testing. Me like. Brought up the sales book w/ Manong after class; h/t to @ReturnOfTheDad for bringing that up. I talked about upping our sign game. Manong said it would run us $500 to get a sign up, and we don't have that kind of money on tap right now. Damn.

 

Afterward, I went to a game night with a friend. Arkham Horror. Started at 19:30 and didn't end until, like 02:00, I think? Went a while. I was the odd man out on account of the fact that I barely knew most of the people there, but they were cool. I wound up introverting pretty hard; that's on me.

 

Today should be boxing, I think. And upper body stuff; it'll be the last day of it before I dissect and re-optimize this. Hell of a time for it, too, since this upcoming weekend I'm off to a con with the publicists. I'm helping to work a table with the one author we've got so far, and we're working alongside some more experience writer-marketers. One of them is a martial artist who has set up a panel for helping writers with fight stuff, and I've volunteered to be a body for that because I've got a pretty wide movement vocabulary despite my lack of depth. Should be exciting, but I'll have to take the day from work. Which is nice to be able to do.

[Urgan]

19 hours ago, Kishi said:

Saturday was Kali. Got to work with someone who was more about good pressure testing. Me like. Brought up the sales book w/ Manong after class; h/t to @ReturnOfTheDad for bringing that up. I talked about upping our sign game. Manong said it would run us $500 to get a sign up, and we don't have that kind of money on tap right now. Damn.

 

Pass the hat mebbe?

 

19 hours ago, Kishi said:

Today should be boxing, I think. And upper body stuff; it'll be the last day of it before I dissect and re-optimize this. Hell of a time for it, too, since this upcoming weekend I'm off to a con with the publicists. I'm helping to work a table with the one author we've got so far, and we're working alongside some more experience writer-marketers. One of them is a martial artist who has set up a panel for helping writers with fight stuff, and I've volunteered to be a body for that because I've got a pretty wide movement vocabulary despite my lack of depth. Should be exciting, but I'll have to take the day from work. Which is nice to be able to do.

 

Why did my mind immediately go to "synonyms for 'pain'?" lol....

[Kishi]

2 minutes ago, Urgan said:

Pass the hat mebbe?

 

I mean. I'd donate.

 

2 minutes ago, Urgan said:

Why did my mind immediately go to "synonyms for 'pain'?" lol....

 

In your defense, that's a fair place to go.

 

*

 

So, ran over the plan last night and realized it'd be a lot simpler to just focus on getting to bed earlier so that I could be up earlier and use the time better. Better sleep hygiene? Can do.

 

Beyond that, though, not much. I did upper body stuff after boxing and it all turned out okay. My insights about how to get extra volume before condensing it down appear to have been effective, in that I'm better able to condense the volume down the more of it I get. It's such a contrast from the way I've been doing it; it feels good, like I'm actually making progress.

 

Rest day today. Feels good to take it easy. Went to give blood today and my RHR was 52. Holy crap.

[Mistr]

5 hours ago, Kishi said:

So, ran over the plan last night and realized it'd be a lot simpler to just focus on getting to bed earlier so that I could be up earlier and use the time better. Better sleep hygiene? Can do.

 

Funny how sleep is so often the answer.

 

5 hours ago, Kishi said:

Rest day today. Feels good to take it easy. Went to give blood today and my RHR was 52. Holy crap.

 

Wow, you are obviously doing many things right.

 

Interesting to hear what the story was on the changes at your dojo. I'm glad that all the stories converged. You would be in an awkward place if you were hearing different things from the three senseis. Hopefully you will be able to continue to train while the dust settles.

[Kishi]

16 hours ago, Mistr said:

Funny how sleep is so often the answer.

 

Yeah. It's also the one thing I've been socialized to cut out. Fighting for it is hard - even if I fight off everyone else, I still have to fight myself.

 

16 hours ago, Mistr said:

Wow, you are obviously doing many things right.

 

That or the dude taking my pulse did it wrong. But whatever. It's nice to feel that all settling out again.

 

16 hours ago, Mistr said:

Interesting to hear what the story was on the changes at your dojo. I'm glad that all the stories converged. You would be in an awkward place if you were hearing different things from the three senseis. Hopefully you will be able to continue to train while the dust settles.

 

Well, it doesn't help anything that none of my teachers are strong communicators. K-sensei's a lecturer; he'll give you lots of information but not necessarily the right information. Manong's kind of the opposite - he keeps his own confidence and doesn't give much out, and he's got some linguistic limitations in terms of what he tells you. And J-sensei... ah, well, let's just say that when he starts talking to you, he was in the middle of another conversation even if nobody else was there.

 

They're good teachers, to be clear; their weaknesses are offset by their strengths, but no matter what anyone says this was pretty clearly a dramatic incident, and drama exacerbates things in people for better or for worse. At this point I'm having to put two and two together, and so far it's checking out, but I'm sure I'll get more details, different interpretations, things like that that are going to muddy the waters.

 

*

 

Yesterday finished as an off day. It was nice. D&D that night with my first ever naval battle. We were outmanned and outgunned, but we managed to bravely run away.  We even got a ship out of the bargain; if we can get a crew, we might just be dangerous in our setting.

 

Today, I'm not sure what's going to happen. Work's been opened up for OT this week, and my caseload is such right now that it's a bad look if I don't take advantage of that. I've decided to compromise with myself by allowing myself to leave out if I get a certain amount of work done; this may or may not happen. Worst case, it means I get a night off for shadowboxing and bagwork at the new gym, and I'll even have time to write and maybe even read challenging books. (what. It could happen).

 

So. It's all up in the air right now. Let's see where it lands.

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

1 hour ago, Kishi said:

Yesterday finished as an off day. It was nice. D&D that night with my first ever naval battle. We were outmanned and outgunned, but we managed to bravely run away.  We even got a ship out of the bargain; if we can get a crew, we might just be dangerous in our setting.

Well done sailor!

[Kishi]

So, Tuesday wound up being a night off. I got a lot of work done, but it wasn't enough and it wasn't done fast enough, so I had to stay. I got the word back from K-sensei about what to practice on the bag and did so; I was then able to go ahead and get the KB work done as well because I'm still relatively weak and their bells are relatively light.

 

The new gym continues to be good.  These heavy bags, though, man, they are hard like they got something to prove. Fortunately, I have wrist wraps and I know how to use 'em, so it's no big deal to me. And, in my practice, I was able to maybe possibly identify a new combination that I haven't played with before? I dunno; feels kind of weird.

 

The only problem is, I got to the gym late because I got out of work late and got my grocery shopping done, uh, late. Vicious cycle. Was up way too late and got up late and got to work late as a result.

 

The thing is, this is stupid because it seems that if I know I have something to be up for in the morning, I can't sleep in. My body wakes me up ahead of the alarm. So, the only way to get my sleep hygiene on track is to get to bed earlier, and the only for-sure way I can see to do that involves cutting out social media and a lot of my YouTube bingeing. I have the tools in place to do that. I've lacked the will, but it's the only thing I can think to do, and nothing decompresses one quite like a good night's sleep.

 

I looked at my weight notes and noticed that I've been practicing a cut of some kind or other for the past few months. In keeping with my goal of spiting the scales next month, I'm electing to go back up to maintenance for a few months. Let my metabolism catch some rest for a bit. Fortunately, I know what that looks like and I'm optimistic that I can keep to the lower weight or something like it pretty easily.

[Mistr]

1 hour ago, Kishi said:

The only problem is, I got to the gym late because I got out of work late and got my grocery shopping done, uh, late. Vicious cycle. Was up way too late and got up late and got to work late as a result.

 

Been there, done that far too often. Like yesterday.

 

At least my work hours are fixed so I don't have the option of coming in late. I can stay late if I need to. The real problem is in making good decisions when sleep deprived. Something has to give and often I choose the wrong thing. Like staying up late again instead of postponing something.  

[Kishi]

On ‎1‎/‎9‎/‎2019 at 1:21 PM, Mistr said:

 

Been there, done that far too often. Like yesterday.

 

At least my work hours are fixed so I don't have the option of coming in late. I can stay late if I need to. The real problem is in making good decisions when sleep deprived. Something has to give and often I choose the wrong thing. Like staying up late again instead of postponing something.  

 

Right? Like, I don't understand what's so compelling about being up. But there it is, that sense that somehow I'm wasting time and falling behind, and it's not true but.

 

*

 

So. I think the hypothyroidism is playing with my weight. Because my scale today on the first day of maintenance is agreeing with the other scales.

 

Well, bugger. No wonder I've had so much trouble setting macros. If I can't get a close-enough picture of reality, I can't set anything right.

 

Fortunately, though, those long notes I've been keeping help with establishing the pattern - a long time in the 190s with an occasional dip down into the 180s before bouncing back up. I've actually wound up gaining a couple of pounds despite my attempts. Fortunately, it's not all bad news - my other measurement shows that I've made a big improvement in terms of my overall composition - a bit broader in the shoulders, a bit narrower in the waist.

 

So screw this cutting noise. If all I'm going to do is be hungry for months at a time and gum up my recovery and my metabolism, then it's not even worth it. I might as well just stick to maintenance/recomp and let the chips fall where they will.

 

(and in three months when I've swung back to wanting to cut again, seriously, someone kick me in the head and bring this up).

 

Anyway, lost out on viewing time again last night due to OT. So, I wound up going to the gym and walking on the treadmill. Their treadmills let you walk for an hour and a half, and I was like, "Oh, that's cool, I'll do that," but I totally forgot that I was doing so at about 8:30 or so at night and wound up with another late night despite myself. Damn.

 

Sinuses were draining yesterday and are draining harder today; that's a sign of sick. Tonight is not a mat night; IDGAF what K-sensei says. I'm not even going off to hit the heavy bag. Deload protocol goes into effect today; I'll be playing with the new handstand progression on low setting and will do kata afterward.

[Teirin]

7 hours ago, Kishi said:

So screw this cutting noise. If all I'm going to do is be hungry for months at a time and gum up my recovery and my metabolism, then it's not even worth it. I might as well just stick to maintenance/recomp and let the chips fall where they will.

 

<3

[Urgan]

21 hours ago, Kishi said:

So screw this cutting noise. If all I'm going to do is be hungry for months at a time and gum up my recovery and my metabolism, then it's not even worth it. I might as well just stick to maintenance/recomp and let the chips fall where they will.

 

(and in three months when I've swung back to wanting to cut again, seriously, someone kick me in the head and bring this up).

 

[Treva]

On 1/10/2019 at 1:52 PM, Kishi said:

 

 

So. I think the hypothyroidism is playing with my weight. Because my scale today on the first day of maintenance is agreeing with the other scales.

 

Well, bugger. No wonder I've had so much trouble setting macros. If I can't get a close-enough picture of reality, I can't set anything right.

Curse you endocrinology!!!!!

But seriously I'm glad you at least found an answer.  The thyroid can be Such A Butt.  

 

On 1/10/2019 at 1:52 PM, Kishi said:

 

So screw this cutting noise. If all I'm going to do is be hungry for months at a time and gum up my recovery and my metabolism, then it's not even worth it. I might as well just stick to maintenance/recomp and let the chips fall where they will.

 

(and in three months when I've swung back to wanting to cut again, seriously, someone kick me in the head and bring this up

Screw that noise indeed.  Stick to something that keeps you fueled and if you need reminding, that's what workout buddies are for.  With probably less violence though, that sounds like cruisin  for a bruisin.

 

On 1/10/2019 at 1:52 PM, Kishi said:

 

Sinuses were draining yesterday and are draining harder today; that's a sign of sick. Tonight is not a mat night; IDGAF what K-sensei says. I'm not even going off to hit the heavy bag. Deload protocol goes into effect today; I'll be playing with the new handstand progression on low setting and will do kata afterward.

Yes.  Perhaps the sinuses say this is not a good mat night.  Resting is good for the mighty warrior, do the deload, and you will continue to Boss All The Things like ya do on the regular.  

[Kishi]

On ‎1‎/‎10‎/‎2019 at 8:54 PM, Teirin said:

 

<3

 

OH HAI~

 

On ‎1‎/‎11‎/‎2019 at 11:01 AM, Urgan said:

 

 

Have I ever mentioned how glad I am that you're always here for me?

 

On ‎1‎/‎12‎/‎2019 at 6:45 PM, Treva said:

Curse you endocrinology!!!!!

But seriously I'm glad you at least found an answer.  The thyroid can be Such A Butt.  

 

Right! Because the scale runs its calculations for bodyfat based off of weight and bio impedance so it's just... ugh. Bugger. Thank God for that third measurement.

 

On ‎1‎/‎12‎/‎2019 at 6:45 PM, Treva said:

Screw that noise indeed.  Stick to something that keeps you fueled and if you need reminding, that's what workout buddies are for.  With probably less violence though, that sounds like cruisin  for a bruisin.

 

Yeah, but see, the nice thing about having a face like mine is it can get hit so many times and come out looking the same.

 

On ‎1‎/‎12‎/‎2019 at 6:45 PM, Treva said:

Yes.  Perhaps the sinuses say this is not a good mat night.  Resting is good for the mighty warrior, do the deload, and you will continue to Boss All The Things like ya do on the regular.

 

Hai. It was necessary. See below...

 

*

 

So, Friday, the head cold showed up in force. It was the kind that I would have probably taken a day off for, and instead what did I do? I went to Illogicon, because I was apparently determined to cosplay as a Con Crud Vector.

 

Seriously, what is it with me and cons and going with a problem? I was a temporary cripple last time; I'm kind of scared to see what the next one has in store.

 

Anyway, as you can imagine, I didn't really do any training for the next few days. I spent most of my time being awkward at the booth, which sucks. I'd hoped to be smoother; I'm not sure if I was just channeling some of my latent insecurity about my writing as well as being spaced on meds or what. But I want to do a better job next time.

 

As for the con itself, it was actually really, really small. There were a lot of independent content creators and such like that, but there really weren't a lot of goers there. I'm not really sure why. The con had been displaced from its original location due to some construction at the original site, and also there's a Comicon going in March. I think between the change in locale and the decision to save up for the next con we probably lost a ton of attendance there.

 

Which isn't to say it was a loss! My friend whom I was going with brought a bunch of hardcopies of her book and managed to sell out, and the people we were apprenticing under made enough to cover the cost of the table. It also wound up being a good networking opportunity; we apparently have some future publicist work lined up for Falstaff Books which is a local press run out of Charlotte, and we got to chat with some authors that she'd wanted to connect with for a while anyway. A lot of the authors who were there were very interested in the publicizing services. We also ran into a gentleman who apparently has good enough advice that my friend is trying to cultivate it as a mentorship/consulting relationship.

 

So not a loss by any means, even if what we got wasn't what we were looking for.

 

Also, Sunday I got to be a prop for a martial arts demo. It was pretty cool. The dude putting on the demo was definitely more traditional than I prefer, and I would have been happy to speak up but we had another gent in there who was talking himself up as a badass and I figured two teachers was enough. I kept my peace.

 

Monday, I called out sick and flopped. I got up just early enough to leave the sick message and then slept until the afternoon. Think I needed it. Had interesting dreams, could maybe make a story of it? Not sure what or how, though. Just lots of interesting pieces. Spent the day resting and recovering and by the evening was pretty much over it enough to go out and game. Got into a newer system - The Dark Eye, Germany's answer to D&D. Lots of cool backgrounds and character concepts; I wound up making a female half elf explorer/pastry chef. That's right, I made a genderbent cross of Indiana Jones and Anthony Bourdain. She's gonna be awesome. I can tell.

 

Tuesday, I was still a bit under the weather and elected to stay off the mats. Did do deloaded S&S, though, and that felt okay. I didn't wake up this morning with a relapse, which is a good sign.

 

Tonight I got enough work done to leave at normal time, but now my scifi watching buddy is down with work.

 

 

So I guess it's another night in the salt mines. Oh well. At least I'll have my OT to keep me warm...

[Urgan]

5 minutes ago, Kishi said:

Have I ever mentioned how glad I am that you're always here for me?

 

You could text me at 3AM any day asking whether you should cut and I could give you the answer in a heartbeat.

 

6 minutes ago, Kishi said:

Seriously, what is it with me and cons and going with a problem? I was a temporary cripple last time; I'm kind of scared to see what the next one has in store.

 

Some anti-convention biased supernatural force is sitting beside itself watching you like

 

 

[Kishi]

19 hours ago, Urgan said:

You could text me at 3AM any day asking whether you should cut and I could give you the answer in a heartbeat.

 

Would the answer change at 03:01?

 

19 hours ago, Urgan said:

Some anti-convention biased supernatural force is sitting beside itself watching you like

 

 

 

Yeah, and I feel it. That's what got me so on edge.

 

*

 

So. Last night was a rest night and I wasn't terribly inclined to change it. Fortunately, I'd known that something like this could happen, so I'd made the call to pack some gym clothes and stopped by on the way home. Plan was to only walk as long as I'd had content to watch. Wound up with about 100 minutes' worth of content to watch, so the late night cycle commenced again. No real regrets, though.

 

Today should be karate and handstands. I say should; I've got a certain amount of work to get done before I'm comfy giving myself the all-clear to leave. I'm on track to do so, but I've been on track and had things take a sideways turn before, so we'll see what happens.

[Kishi]

RAAAAAAAH SIDEWAYS TURNS

 

Had to get one last case developed to a certain degree. Found one and thought, oh, this will be easy. And it turned out to have 1000+ pages of evidence around a particularly complicated impairment, and the way it was scanned in made it difficult for the reader to process such that the whole thing crashed two or three times in development. What should have taken 20-30 minutes wound up taking a good 3 hours, went way into OT, and cost me my training opportunity for the night.

 

...

 

Still, my emotions aside, it was necessary. This dude has a really serious problem, one of those that we're really meant to help with. I did a Good Thing, and I know it, and it's stupid to be angry because I missed out on what's ultimately a hobby. The real reason I was upset last night was that, well, Acts of Service is one of the primary languages I use to show my affection for the people around me, and showing up on the mats is a way to show my affection for the people there. Having to do this work - what turned out to be a deeply complicated thing that really had no business being so - felt like making a poor trade, like I was being forced to give up something I wanted for something that wasn't all that urgent.

 

So lots of sadness and anger, and that was exacerbated by a sense of empathy with this claimant and his issues. He wasn't much older than me and here he was needing all this help, not just from us but from the people around him.

 

...

 

Stupid thyroid medications. Stupid attempts to ramp the testosterone. I liked my emotions better when they were distant and out of my way.

 

As always, though, it's not all bad news. I woke up this morning and ran my measurements ahead of some debauchery tonight/this weekend. I was afraid that going on maintenance would screw me up somehow, but it was all good news - weight's stable, body fat percentage trending down, Adonis Index trending up (which is good news - currently sitting at 1.31; I'd like to see if the current regimen will get me to 1.4). Last night I was able to walk and do handstand training, and also ran some kata. Even got some shadowboxing in again; this is a habit I'd like to return to.

 

And, all the work I've done in the past few days lets me clock 40 hours early, so I'mma take off early today to go ahead and do gym training and get cleaned up. Because, baby, I'm over this week.

 

I forgot to mention - I've distinguished myself to the publicists. I ran a good analysis of a promotional platform and wowed them with my skillz, so now they want me to do more. That's nice, although as usual they underestimate how busy I am so it's gonna be a minute before I get to the next one. I got my own problems to solve.

 

Anyway. Legz, abz today. And then... whatever comes.

 

Oh, and tomorrow should be interesting. Another knife demo; this time for a store that specialized in gaming and anime prop blades. In the local mall. Holy crap, the times. They have changed.

[Urgan]

22 hours ago, Kishi said:

Would the answer change at 03:01?

 

 

22 hours ago, Kishi said:

Yeah, and I feel it. That's what got me so on edge.

 

Don't try to force the issue. Beware of what you wish for. Etc.

 

38 minutes ago, Kishi said:

Had to get one last case developed to a certain degree. Found one and thought, oh, this will be easy. And it turned out to have 1000+ pages of evidence around a particularly complicated impairment, and the way it was scanned in made it difficult for the reader to process such that the whole thing crashed two or three times in development. What should have taken 20-30 minutes wound up taking a good 3 hours, went way into OT, and cost me my training opportunity for the night.

 

...

 

Still, my emotions aside, it was necessary. This dude has a really serious problem, one of those that we're really meant to help with. I did a Good Thing, and I know it, and it's stupid to be angry because I missed out on what's ultimately a hobby. The real reason I was upset last night was that, well, Acts of Service is one of the primary languages I use to show my affection for the people around me, and showing up on the mats is a way to show my affection for the people there. Having to do this work - what turned out to be a deeply complicated thing that really had no business being so - felt like making a poor trade, like I was being forced to give up something I wanted for something that wasn't all that urgent.

 

So lots of sadness and anger, and that was exacerbated by a sense of empathy with this claimant and his issues. He wasn't much older than me and here he was needing all this help, not just from us but from the people around him.

 

tl;dr version: You had to be at work longer than you had to be at work and that sucks. Who wants to be at work longer than about 4 hours less than you typically have to be at work? It has nothing to do with the relative worthiness of the work being done.

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

44 minutes ago, Kishi said:

and it's stupid to be angry because I missed out on what's ultimately a hobby. 

It is not stupid! Your emotions are never stupid, nor are they ever smart. They are never wise, nor foolish, neither are they ever good or bad. They simply are. Any normal person would be angry at having to stay late at work because something was scanned wrong. Even if you didn't have plans that were important to you there would still be ample reason to feel angry. It's never wrong to feel an emotion.

[Kishi]

3 hours ago, Urgan said:

Don't try to force the issue. Beware of what you wish for. Etc.

 

I know! My friend is like, "Don't worry about when the next con is" and I'm like "BUT I NEED TO PREPARE"

 

3 hours ago, Urgan said:

tl;dr version: You had to be at work longer than you had to be at work and that sucks. Who wants to be at work longer than about 4 hours less than you typically have to be at work? It has nothing to do with the relative worthiness of the work being done.

 

Yeah, and it was a combination thing. Like, I'd worked so hard on Wednesday to get out just to find that there was nothing to get to, and then Thursday I worked at that same pace and still couldn't get anything to move my way. Deeply frustrating.

 

3 hours ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

It is not stupid! Your emotions are never stupid, nor are they ever smart. They are never wise, nor foolish, neither are they ever good or bad. They simply are. Any normal person would be angry at having to stay late at work because something was scanned wrong. Even if you didn't have plans that were important to you there would still be ample reason to feel angry. It's never wrong to feel an emotion.

 

You're right. But there's a difference between feeling something and acting on that feeling. But then, in fairness to you, I don't always make that distinction so well, so that sometimes I mistake the feeling for the action. If that makes sense? So like anger goes from a noun to a verb for me in terms of how I think of it sometimes.

 

Thanks for calling me on that, though. 'ppreciate it.

[Tanktimus the Encourager]

1 minute ago, Kishi said:

 

I know! My friend is like, "Don't worry about when the next con is" and I'm like "BUT I NEED TO PREPARE"

 

 

Yeah, and it was a combination thing. Like, I'd worked so hard on Wednesday to get out just to find that there was nothing to get to, and then Thursday I worked at that same pace and still couldn't get anything to move my way. Deeply frustrating.

 

 

You're right. But there's a difference between feeling something and acting on that feeling. But then, in fairness to you, I don't always make that distinction so well, so that sometimes I mistake the feeling for the action. If that makes sense? So like anger goes from a noun to a verb for me in terms of how I think of it sometimes.

 

Thanks for calling me on that, though. 'ppreciate it.

I would suggest to you that acting on the anger can be a good thing, depending on what you do. Using or to fuel a workout, channeling it into some form of art, or even letting it motivate you to make positive changes are all examples of good actions that come from anger. 

[Kishi]

9 minutes ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

I would suggest to you that acting on the anger can be a good thing, depending on what you do. Using or to fuel a workout, channeling it into some form of art, or even letting it motivate you to make positive changes are all examples of good actions that come from anger. 

 

Yup, and that's the trick. Because you can do good things with it, but you can also do bad things with it too, and I've made friends with so many delicate people whom I just stumble my way into hurting. It used to be, the anger was distant and no trouble, but it feels... much closer now? Not so far under the surface as I like to keep it.

[Urgan]

8 minutes ago, Kishi said:

I know! My friend is like, "Don't worry about when the next con is" and I'm like "BUT I NEED TO PREPARE"

 

Mebbe you don't, dude. If it stresses you out, flippin' don't do it. It's supposed to be fun. I'm not saying don't do cons, cons are fun and cool and you've got friends that go, too. But if they aren't fun for YOU and specifically not at the moment while you have so many competing interests sapping you to the point where you're compromised and any little thing could take you out, maybe it's less about the shoe and more about the feeling of the shoe about to drop that is the reason to readjust your agenda during con time.

 

Maybe it's literally the last straw and you're the camel. I'm just sayin'.

 

11 minutes ago, Kishi said:

Yeah, and it was a combination thing. Like, I'd worked so hard on Wednesday to get out just to find that there was nothing to get to, and then Thursday I worked at that same pace and still couldn't get anything to move my way. Deeply frustrating.

 

That is Support Life and we feel your pain,  have been there. Anything that involves case load/queues/staying on call by a phone can have this workflow. It is not the funnest part of helping people.

13 minutes ago, Kishi said:

You're right. But there's a difference between feeling something and acting on that feeling. But then, in fairness to you, I don't always make that distinction so well, so that sometimes I mistake the feeling for the action. If that makes sense? So like anger goes from a noun to a verb for me in terms of how I think of it sometimes.

 

10 minutes ago, Tanktimus the Encourager said:

I would suggest to you that acting on the anger can be a good thing, depending on what you do. Using or to fuel a workout, channeling it into some form of art, or even letting it motivate you to make positive changes are all examples of good actions that come from anger. 

 

Just now, Kishi said:

 

Yup, and that's the trick. Because you can do good things with it, but you can also do bad things with it too, and I've made friends with so many delicate people whom I just stumble my way into hurting. It used to be, the anger was distant and no trouble, but it feels... much closer now? Not so far under the surface as I like to keep it.

 

I've never been a "lift angry" kind of person, but being angry/upset and lifting helps calm me down, as being a "nervous" ball of emotion isn't great times for me personally. Finding something to do with negative energy that creates a good outcome for you and others (but not at your expense) is a good idea. That stress shizz has a way of building up on you and let me say it doesn't help making doing extra stuff such as going to cons any more straightforward.

[Kishi]

On 1/18/2019 at 3:28 PM, Urgan said:

Mebbe you don't, dude. If it stresses you out, flippin' don't do it. It's supposed to be fun. I'm not saying don't do cons, cons are fun and cool and you've got friends that go, too. But if they aren't fun for YOU and specifically not at the moment while you have so many competing interests sapping you to the point where you're compromised and any little thing could take you out, maybe it's less about the shoe and more about the feeling of the shoe about to drop that is the reason to readjust your agenda during con time.

 

Aah, no, I'm not presenting well. I mean it in the teasing sense of, "Oh God, Cons are some Final Destination-style ish. I'm not careful, and I'mma be cosplaying a pirate because I got amputated! Or a corpse because I died." To be completely frank, it is kind of stressful to be spending time off the mats, but it's a eustress as I've experienced it, you know? I get to be a nerd and into the things that people are into but also bring a unique set of experiences that so many people don't really have. And I get to be around a bunch of people who offer me the same thing. It's genuinely fun to be a part of all that.

 

Unfortunately, I seem to have had the bad timing to experience some distress at the same time that I'm being tongue-in-cheek about a eustress, and so I haven't communicated very well. Sorry for that. That being said, your advice is as sound as ever, and maybe I am being dishonest with myself about what this represents to me. I think in a lot of ways though, a lot of stress was tied to being sick and not training and eating at maintenance and dealing with body image brain weasels and stuff like that. This past week, as I've got back to the grind, even on deload, I've felt better, you know?

 

On 1/18/2019 at 3:28 PM, Urgan said:

That is Support Life and we feel your pain,  have been there. Anything that involves case load/queues/staying on call by a phone can have this workflow. It is not the funnest part of helping people.

 

Yeah. It's bitter work. It's necessary work, though, and a lot of the reason that it sucks has a lot to with us being chronically understaffed due to our budget cuts and a bunch of elderly staff retiring out. Like, I took two days off for the con and recovery. It's taken a week to get even halfway back on track and it'll take another week before I'm back on it. That sucks.

 

On 1/18/2019 at 3:28 PM, Urgan said:

I've never been a "lift angry" kind of person, but being angry/upset and lifting helps calm me down, as being a "nervous" ball of emotion isn't great times for me personally. Finding something to do with negative energy that creates a good outcome for you and others (but not at your expense) is a good idea. That stress shizz has a way of building up on you and let me say it doesn't help making doing extra stuff such as going to cons any more straightforward.

 

Well, I've been a lift angry person before, and it has helped, although it's definitely not great to default to that. To be frank about it, though, the training does help with mitigating the stress, but if I do the stress without doing the training to help mitigate it, well. Because between deloaded handstand work and the treadmill, it's just not enough. Especially when I was jonesing to get on the mats for the reasons listed above.

[Urgan]

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