That which cannot be seen
Then and Now
I had not intended to take a self-portrait this evening; however, as I pulled out my flashes and umbrellas in preparation to take some photos of my friend Shilpa tomorrow, I thought: Why not.
However, even deeper than that, I wanted to witness the change from more than a year ago, give myself a pat on the back, and thank those who have been behind me.
At the beginning of each Zen Super Boot Camp, we make mention of good things that are going on, struggles that we are having, or whatever seems appropriate. Yesterday, Tuesday night, I spoke up and made mention that I had made it to the half-way point of my goal, which was to lose 100 pounds, or about 45.5 Kg, within one year. I received a round of applause. I’ve done this in 5 months, almost to the day. Just a few days earlier than 5 months, actually. 
So far, I’ve lost 52 pounds, 23.6 Kg. A laudable accomplishment, I think.
Though I am the one doing the work of walking each morning, making good food choices, etc, I cannot give enough credit to the group at the ZSBC. What a great group of individuals. We have a great time each week, share our stories, our struggles, and then we have a spirited workout where we sweat, sweat, and laugh.
There’s something magical, it seems, about martial arts. There are so many intangibles, especially when the art is taught along with the philosophy, as it is done at The Peaceful Dragon. With each new part of a form that I learn, with each time that I’m able to do something new, or able to hold a position for even 5 seconds more than I could last week, my confidence soars.
So, about the portrait, I feel that in the second one I am much more confident, comfortable, and, for lack of a better word, balanced.
Life has brought me a lot of changes in the past 2 years. A lot. Some of you know of what I speak, others do not; however, I can honestly say that at this point in my life, I am seriously enjoying it and it has a little to do with the weight loss, but I have a completely different mindset. I feel much better about me. There are lots of internal changes going on.
I’ll probably make another then and now post some 25 pounds from now and then, finally, in April of next year, after I celebrate 100!
Note: Although the photo says February 2009, I was the same size, perhaps a bit larger, in April of 2010.
Funny thing: I changed my Facebook photo to the new photo and got post on my wall saying that the new photo was AWESOME. Cool!
It’s all gone now
Found memories
This is an image of the former YWCA (Young Women’s Christian Association). When I was younger, we’d catch the bus downtown and walk to the YWCA. They had swimming for 2 hours for $1.00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. It was fun stuff.
Last year, I made a book for SoFoBoMo, In Retrospect, which can be found here. It was inspired by a trip that I made back to Ohio to visit my sister. In the book I took you on journey from elementary to high school. At the time of that writing, my high school, Central-Hower, had been closed.
When I went back this year for a visit, I found that both my middle school, Goodrich Middle School, and my elementary school had been closed as well. The elementary school, McEbright Elementary, has been torn down and is being replaced by what they are now calling Learning Centers. These are two floor, high tech elementary schools.
I took Chris Klug by the school to show it to him, as he was interested in where I lived and where I went to school. I was shocked to see that the school no longer existed, but found instead, the skeletal beginnings of the new learning center. Time marches on. Now, even as I type this, I remember my old school, the faint smell of coal dust from the furnace in the basement, and the sounds of traffic that passed on Cole Avenue. The school was so old that it was not air conditioned. I wish that I could have walked the halls once more.
So, the moral of this story is, if you are thinking about doing a book, or anything, do it now. Don’t wait for tomorrow, for tomorrow, you might not have the opportunity … it just might be gone.
Suddenly, my walk didn’t seem so long
This is a photo of my favorite statue in Akron. It’s a sculpture of a Native American carrying his canoe between the waters of the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas rivers. Carrying a canoe or watercraft between two navigable bodies of water is called a Portage. This sculpture is on an appropriately named street, Portage Path. The history of Portage Path is that it was an 8 mile portage between the previously mentioned rivers. The Native Americans used this path to carry their canoes between those bodies of water.
I walked a good deal this weekend. Nearly 11 miles on Saturday morning and about 9.5 on Sunday morning. Monday morning, I had to give my feet and joints a bit of a rest, only walked about 3, perhaps 4. Anyway, I stopped along the Towpath trail, which is a trail between Akron and Cleveland, Ohio. This is the same path that the Erie and Ohio Canal used to get goods between Akron and Cleveland. Of course, I didn’t walk the entire distance or I doubt that I’d be writing this right now! I would have been exhausted.
As I was walking, I thought of how they carried canoes across those vast distances. 8 miles is no joke just walking; however, carrying a canoe and walking, well, that’s a whole different story. It’s no wonder they were in such great shape!
I’m glad to say that at no part during my walk did I have to carry anything heavier than my S90!
Flashback: Childhood memories
During this morning’s walk, I had a childhood memory flashback. We were about half way through the walk, heading northwest, or thereabouts. I looked up, saw this cloud formation and immediately thought: Look! There’s a porpoise. Immediately, I had a flood of childhood memories.
I remembered reclining on the grass, a blade of grass sticking out of my mouth like a proper country boy, watching the clouds go by, their amorphous shapes shifting in and out of recognition, limited only by my imagination. My memories tell me that I spent lots of time doing that, but in reality, it was probably for brief moments of time, as it was summer, school was out, I always had something else to do.
Thinking of that reclining on grass, I remember when I had to cut the same lawn. It seemed like acres and acres, but it was really a postage stamp sized lawn, easily cut in a few minutes. But, when you don’t want to do the task, it can seem vast. That connected to another memory of when I became industrious and put the lawnmower to use by going around and offering to cut lawns for $5.00. I made quite a bit of money. During the off-season, I collected soda bottles, which had a deposit of two cents, glass milk jugs were worth 10 cents, but were rarely to be found!
Of course, like any proper, well fed young man, all of my money went to junk food … that was before I discovered cameras!
Commitment
Peek-a-boo
In this post, I’m about to use a word that I’ve never used before, but have always wanted to: autodidact, so look for it.
The other day I was at, where else, The Peaceful Dragon. And, usual, the following folks were there: Robert, Carrie, Chad, and Jesse. These folks basically live there. I think that Sifu may need to start charging rent! Each time that I get there, I see at least 2 of them outside running, carrying heavy stuff, flipping this big ass tractor tire, or working out. Currently, they are training for a tournament in Baltimore, this weekend I believe.
I look at them and seriously admiring them for the commitment, sometimes thinking: How can I be committed like they are? One day, Robert said to me: Man, Paul! You are melting away. Every time that I see you, you look smaller. Of course, I smiled at this and he asked what was doing. I told him about the 20 – 25 miles of walking per week, the changes in the food, changes in habit; he knows how often I’m there, etc. In reading the book, Living An Extraordinary Life, by Robert White, he talks about commitment. He says that your results show where your commitment lies, regardless of what your words say. Sometimes, I doubt my commitment in certain things, or my ability to be committed to something. However, when I look at the results in various things, I have to cut myself some slack.
For the most part, I am an autodidact (there it is!). I’m self-taught in a number of things. School doesn’t seem to move at the right pace for some things. I’d rather experience them than to read a book. Things that were self-taught and I have been committed at:
1. When I got my first computer, a TRS-80, I learned BASIC, then when that was not enough went on to teach myself Assembler. This helped a great deal when I had an Assembler class in college. I breezed through it. I spent countless hours learning assembler.
2. When I picked up my first camera … well, you know the rest. That was 31 years ago.
3. When I wanted to become a professional bowler, I used to bowl well over 100 games/week. I did this for several years. Soaking all of my part-time money into bowling and gas. Great results, but not quite a professional.
4. When I learned C++, I would get up at 2:00 AM and study/practice until it was time to go to work. In short order, I became one of the best around the workplace. I shunned television and spent all of my time learning more about C++
5. This blog. Though I’ve slowed down posting of late, I have been going for 4 years. Amazing.
6. For the past 6 weeks, Hobbs and have been walking, 6 days/week, at least 1 hour, 15 minutes/day. I let nothing get in the way … not even work.
7. Save for today, I’ve not missed a single class at TPD! I will make up this class this week, so it will still count as 3 classes/week.
These things are examples, to myself, of my commitment to various things and show me what is possible.
I’m sure that you have many of your own.
Drinking the Kool-Aid
Left to right: Adam, Jenny, Paul
After your Tai Chi class on Thursday, Jenny, the lady in the middle, asked Adam and I to pose for a photo with her, each showing us in our stylish black shirts, as we are all part of the Mastery program now. We have given up our white shirts in favor of the black ones. Though, in looking back, I wonder what I was thinking. Perhaps I should have kept that nice, cool, white shirt for the summer months. Working out outside in a black shirt is just asking for heat stroke!
Joining the Mastery Program means that we have contractually committed ourselves to train for a minimum of 3 years. Yep, we signed a 3-year contract. Anyway, the point of the photo was to help inspire Jenny’s friend, Monica to get off the fence and, as another student, Natalia, says: Drink the Kool-Aid!
Jenny sent this photo to Monica and it resulted in a funny exchange of text messages.
At The Peaceful Dragon, we are encouraged to refer to each other as brothers and sisters. Having been there just a few months, I already get that feeling. I find that look forward to going, seeing familiar faces, attending events together, etc. I’d really like to go to Baltimore and see the big martial arts tournament in a couple of weeks, just to support and be there to cheer on my brothers and sisters.
Also, the 3 of us pictured here have our own blogs, too. What do you know? Adam’s blog, Journey of the Pookysan is here. Jenny’s blog, Zen Kayaking can be found here. You already know the location of my blog, or at least I think so.
Lastly, Jenny has graciously offered some of her time to teach me another thing that I wanted to learn, Kayaking. More on that later. She highly suggested that until I get good at it that I invest in an inexpensive, waterproof camera if I want to take photos. Great idea! I know that the D300 is weather resistant, but I don’t think that I want to her it go: Kerplunk! and watch in horror as the air bubbles rise to the service as the water fills the camera and displaces there air within. Nope! Not a sound that I want to hear at all and those air bubbles mean lots of troubles!
The Peaceful Dragon Community
Ommmmm…Ommmmmm…Ommmmm
I’ve been participating in The Peaceful Dragon community for about 6 weeks, perhaps 7. Overall, I’ve attended somewhere between 18 – 21 classes. I’ve met lots of cool people and am enjoying the experience.
What sets this community apart from the normal ‘gym’ experience is that there are people there who know you by name and know a little about you. Therefore, it’s like a bit of a support network. Add to that, Sifu is always adding something to the calendar to get us together, which further strengthens the bond.
Since I’ve been there, I’ve been to three events:
- The Quarterly clean up, where we all pitched in to clean the school, top to bottom.
- Team Tournament Day – an in-house tournament.
- The CACMA (Carolinas Association of Chinese Martial Arts) Kung Fu and Tai Chi Tournament.
There was another event, yesterday. This was the Dragon Boat Festival. I was going to go, but opted for the zoo instead. However, today I will participate in a day-long (9:30 AM – 4:30 PM) Yoga and meditation retreat.
On Friday morning I had breakfast with my ‘buddies’ from Zen Super Boot Camp. Those of us who are members of ZSBC, whose primary goal is weight loss and fitness, are grouped by Sifu into groups of 4. We all trade e-mails and phone numbers. Sometimes we’ll have assignments. He just redid the groupings since we’ve had new people join and others leave. Our first assignment was to go and have a meal together, discuss the menu as to what might be healthy or unhealthy and what might be pleasurable to eat but not so good for us. He keeps drilling into us that food is to nourish the body, not the mind.
Our group had a lovely breakfast together. We sat and talked for about 90 minutes, briefly discussed the menu, and had a great time. One of our members, who’s been there for 12 years, gave us a lot of history about the place and about how the students literally helped to build the existing building.
Based on what I’ve experienced so far, I can see why there are people that I meet that have been training there for more than 10 years. I would say that it is unusual to meet someone at the YMCA who has been training there for 10+ years, but I cannot say that because you usually don’t meet anyone at the YMCA. You come in, do your workout, leave. The Peaceful Dragon is so much more than that and that makes it easy to there. I think that is what will make the difference for me.