Steering the wheel

I started trying something that I first did about 5 years ago. When driving, there is a tendency to grip the wheel tightly, to hold on with both hands and 'muscle' the wheel around. I compared this to the experience of working with a body and it's a similar experience.

I found that it's possible to relax and hold the wheel in a different way. If I relax my shoulders, my arms, forearms, and just let the hands fall into the wheel, then my grip actually tightens. The weight of my arms pulls them into tightening my grip without any strength being applied.

It helps if the wheel is not too slick, on mine it has stitching which I can get more friction off. So, I relax my whole arms, and so my pectoral girdle is more relaxed. I am less tense in the neck, less prone to numbness down the radial and ulnar nerves.

But there is more to it still, when I turn the wheel I am more aware of how a turn to the right pulls my right hand down and my left hand up, . I am more aware that I can turn the wheel either by pulling down, or by pushing up. I am more aware that I can do either or both by moving my centre into the arms. I feel the car more. Feel the road more, feel the turns more. I cant say that I can outreach right through the the tarmac but you get the idea.

It's a similar thing with the pedals, I can press them not with my foot but with my body. I can change gear more smoothly by moving from the centre. 

It's an interesting experiment to play with. I suggest that you do it only at your own risk, but my experience is that it actually improves my driving and my awareness of the road.

The book of not knowing

In keeping with the general theme at the moment, I just ordered the book. Its been out for at least 6 months and I'm only just buying it now. I'll make a review or share my thoughts when I get a chance.

back again

I'm not sure what my motivation was for creating this blog, or why my motivation has lapsed. In truth my motivation seems to have lapsed completely. I cant remember when I last went to a class, and not just Cheng Hsin but any martial art. There isn't really any reason for this, I've just been pulling away.

I guess some of it has been a questioning of things, questioning myself, questioning the system, questioning other people... I've been making some changes too.

I've been questioning my habits and limitations, I started eating fish again after a 17 year break. I remember Peter telling me once that he had been a vegetarian but wasn't anymore. its easy to get stuck into a habit of doing something. More than that it becomes a fixed belief. I believed that eating fish was bad. Honestly more than that I believed that I was superior because I didn't eat it. Now I eat it again I don't feel guilty, I feel free of the limitations of my beliefs.

I had an email from Kevin and began to question my lack of training, lack of motivation, lack of interest. I am still interested but I have been in some other place for a while. But I still love this martial art and still consider myself part of it.

I'm intending to be back, and so I thought I would begin with this intention.

Beginning again

Its been quite a while since I thought about, felt along with and wrote anything worthy of note down. Ironically I intend to begin again at a time when I am under a lot of pressure from a variety of directions. Maybe this is as good a time as any to re-connect with my Cheng Hsin studies and to share something.

I went back to Cheng Hsin class last week, each time I go people are shocked as it is months between visits. I have been happy to see that missing so much time doesnt necessarily mean that I have lost all relaxation, skill or ability. It seems like everything I have gained has been mine to keep. On the other hand I get a strong feeling that I have been doing myself an injustice and that there is a lot more I could have done. I couldnt go this week but visited a different T'ai Chi class with a friend instead. I always find this useful even when there is no comparison, on practicing an exercise with a stranger - a push thing, I was pleased that he felt me get into his feet.

It is sometimes more useful to try and follow someone else's instructions and try to practice falling into my feet, knee with toe, into heel etc without actually being told to do these things. Certainly it is interesting to watch people around me with poor body being and compare with them. Its almost the same as when I pick up a book - such as Zen Body Being, that I havent read in months, and I find myself making sense, new sense of parts of it. Maybe breaks are important, maybe its good to begin again.

Confusion, Grounded, Beauty

Phew, its becoming really hard to have things to write. I've been noticing alot in my training but its not things I can disclose or would want to at this stage. Suffice to say that sometimes the training is more about self, and can be difficult to understand let alone convey.

Tonight I was told that I am grounding well, or at least that I'm better than I was, or that I ground better than one might expect. I'm happy about this, compliments are nice. But I can't really bring myself to believe it, I'd rather believe that it needs much more work. Of course it does, and not being complacent I can keep at it. I wonder what has made the difference though? Is it a mental shift to being 'grounded' that I've made? Or have I become more flexible? or what??

Also, had fun tonight with basic practice, press, and an un-named technique. All in all we seem to be concentrating far less on techniques and trying to do something, achieve something. We spend much more time looking at the relationship and how small change mean big changes, so we talk about foot positions and weight changes and compression into this and that... Its all fun training.

This un-named technique - its beautiful, so simple and so effective, like a Judo throw with zero effort, you simply have to be thrown there is no other option. It is beautiful to watch, graceful to perform and both scary and beautiful to be thrown. Its movements like this that I love about Cheng Hsin. When something just is, and like a wave or a sunrise, is just perfect in its organic unfolding.

Relax

Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax Relax.

Keep training it.

Commitment

Sometimes we hear about people who are afraid of commitment. They feel afraid and therefore avoid entering into relationships in the first place, or they find them so hard that they end them before the other person 'gets too close' or 'is let in'.

It's actually the same with fighting, or at least, in the context we find it most frequently, in training with another person. It's still a relationship. It's still two people relating to each others movements, intention, forces etc.

Frequently, we are afraid of committing ourselves totally to our own actions, let alone to the relationship or interaction that is presenting. We feel afraid in much the same way, we don't want to open up, to get hurt. So we keep the other person out.

But by so doing, we restrict ourselves, keep ourselves out of the relationship. Committing ourselves more fully we are able to learn more deeply. We can let ourselves be thrown or hit, and relax and feel it, see opportunities to blend with it, we can become one with it.

In the end there is only one relationship, and one thing taking place, so let's dive in!