Climbing a mountain instead of sharpening a sword.

Master Brinker talks a lot about that I Ho Chuan and how it is a tool for mastery.  He talks about how most people look at the I Ho Chuan as a mountain that they must climb instead of looking at it like a honing a fine sword.

So which one has my past I Ho Chuan most closely resembled?  Climbing the mountain for sure.  This is the second year (going into my third year) that I have been part of this program and it was very different than my first year.  I started the year very strong and even until mid year things were going well for me.  Then when I left for South Carolina what was a sword became a mountain.  I looked at the requirements and felt that I could keep up with the basics, I could still be engaged in my training.  I failed and I failed miserably.  I lost sight of why I was in the I Ho Chuan, why I was on the path toward mastery.  I let mediocrity begin to creep into my life into my routine.  I told myself that "I'm too busy, I can catch up tomorrow".  I lied to myself and let myself fall off the path.  I must say from experience that when you get off the path you can get back but it's extremely difficult.  I must admit that I wanted to quit Kung Fu all together because I became frustrated with myself and the long journey that's its going to be to just get back to mid year form.  However I didn't give up, I'm back on the path and slowly I am getting myself back into shape and back into form.  I'm focussing on keeping the "highs & lows" in check and allowing myself to enjoy the journey back without being too hard on myself.

I want to finish with a quote that really resonates with me.  It has become the foundation of my journey back toward mastery.

"Greatness is a lot of small things done well"

Ian Repay
Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

Dragon dance - adaptability.

We are getting the dragon dance up to speed very quickly.  I am disappointed that we don't have enough commitment for two dragons.  The initial dance was looking very promising and we had a good little competition going between the two dragons.  However it wasn't meant to be and we just adapted as we always do.  This adaptability is core to our kung fu and I see it happening with this dance.  No one is complaining about all of the changes even though it can be difficult to remember what we all have to do.  We just do it, we just adapt and keep going.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Pressure.

We had our monthly I Ho Chuan meeting yesterday.  Lots was discussed but once again we have a lot a work to do and not a lot of time to do it.  Why is this the same every year?  Why is it that we have to have pressure applied before we get the best out of people?  I know that for me this is how I have always been.  I think I perform best when I'm under pressure.  However this is something I'm working to reduce.  I'm working to reduce the extreme's from my life and so far in the short period of time I feel the benefits.  I 'm feeling less pressure and less stress.  This is harder to adjust to than I envisioned as I have always been a person of extremes.  Extreme high's when things are going good and extreme low's when they aren't.

When it comes to the Chinese New Year's celebration and the preparation, we need to do a better job as a team.  I don't know what the answers are but as a member of the Horse Team for next year this is something I'm going to work on.  I'm learning to enjoy this new way, this way of less peaks and valleys.  I'm going to continue to develop this as the year of the Snake closes and the year of the Horse starts.

Ian Repay
Student of Silent River Kung Fu.

Managing the mental state.

Glad to be back training and very happy that I have been able to manage the "highs & lows".  This is going to be my biggest challenge going forward.  I'm working hard on this as it has a direct impact on my life.  When I think about this in respect to my training I see myself training like a demon when I am motivated.  When I get to a big low I stop training almost all together. When I think about managing these highs and lows in regards to my work life I see the benefits of not getting to these places.  Mentally it's much better for me and I seem to have a much better overall attitude.  I am also making better decisions when they are not influenced by my elevated or lowered mental state. This past week, I made a decision to not return to the San Shou class weekly.  I feel this was a good decision as it gave me an extra day to rest mentally and reflect on my training.  I am looking forward to coming back to this class but I am going to continue to ease back into this class and continue to manage my mental state.

Mr. Repay

Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

Peaks and valleys.

I'm going to ease myself back into training which means being at the Kwoon five days a week instead of six lol! This means that I am going to go to a couple San Shou classes per month instead of every week.  Right now I feel like I need that Tuesday off to rest (physically & mentally) while I work back into shape.  The more important reason that I'm not fully committing to this class is highs & lows.  One thing I have a habit of and want to avoid doing is the "big highs and big lows".  This is a facet of my character that I want to "smooth" out.  I have a habit of training like a mad man when I'm motivated and then when I'm not I don't train very much at all.

I really enjoy the class and see tons of benefits to my training.   However I want to be mindful of my training and approach it a bit differently this time. I need to reduce the high's and low's and try to find a consistent balance in not only my training but in life as well.


Mr. Repay

Student Of Silent River Kung Fu

This is tougher than I thought.

When I set my sights on a earning a black belt in Kung Fu I never envisioned that it would be this difficult.  Don't get me wrong, I knew that it physically would be very difficult.  I just never thought about the mental side of the black belt much if at all. The mental side of anything (work, personal etc) is the toughest thing to keep focused.  We all struggle with this and I am no exception.  In fact these past four weeks I have been finding myself struggling with this more than I ever have before.  These past four weeks have been very difficult and I am struggling to grasp why?

I have always enjoyed my training and I have for the most part always looked forward to class and training.  So why have these four weeks since I have gotten back been so difficult?  I think it has a lot to do with getting settled back in to a new job, back to my old life and trying to catch up on the the months that I have missed.  Could it be the shorter days and less sunlight that is having an impact as well?  Could it be that I have I am extra tough on myself for letting myself slide while I was in South Carolina?  What about losing sight and perspective on how my Kung Fu serves me and not it?  I think it's all of these things rolled up into one and it has gotten me down.  So instead of going to class I avoided going and making excuses to myself of things I needed to do that were more important.  Once I made that first excuse for myself the next one became easier and easier.  The hardest thing to do was to convince myself that I shouldn't give up.  I made a commitment to my team and Master Brinker that even if I failed at achieving my goals the one thing we I couldn't do was quit.  Quitting is something that I am not accustomed to and that thought kept resonating in my mind.

I decided on Saturday to go back to class.  Square up what needed to be squared and renew my commitment to my team and my training.  I am very glad that I listened to my gut and went back.  It seems to have filled an empty void that has been gnawing at my very core.

Mr. Repay

First class back!

last night was my first class back and it felt so great to be back in the Kwoon.  As most know, I was away in South Carolina for the past three months.  Training on your own is very very difficult for most and I was no exception.  However now that I am back I am going to be getting back into my routine of training.  That routine and that energy from the Kwoon and my training mates is hard to replace when you are so far away.


Ian Repay
Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

12 rounds with Iron Mike

Well I have kinda felt like this guy in the past couple of weeks.  I had a very difficult call with a customer and by the time call was completed I felt like I had gone 12 rounds with Iron Mike.

The thing is, it was totally my fault.  I had been having a great couple of weeks and my confidence was a little higher than I needed it to be.  I was overconfident.

Well the result of that "overconfidence" was that the customer exploited every area where I failed to prepare.  He exposed my weaknesses like opponents have done in sparring class.

As difficult as it was to sit there and take it, I learned more than I ever ever had before.  It humbled me and showed me that I am nowhere as good as thought I was.  I learned more from that one call than I could have ever learned from all the good calls I had done in the past three weeks.  I learned that preparation and proper mindset are the most important things.  If I had the proper mindset, I would not have overlooked some of the things I needed to do.  If I was in the proper mindset I would have been better equipped to answer the customers questions.  I can't say enough about the lesson that the customer taught me that afternoon.

Thanks John for teaching me a very important lesson.

Mr. Repay
Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

Home stretch!

I have one final week of training and then I am back home. I can't wait to get back and get some resemblance of normality again. This week I'm in Montreal and I'm very happy to be back on Canadian soil.

I really miss the kwoon and my training mates. I will admit that my training has been no where, where I need it to be. I have a little resemblance to the Michelin Man lol! Oh well i'll work it off and I am really looking forward to sweating and feeling the pain =)

My first day back home is this Saturday and I am going to take up Sifu's challenge of 1000 sit ups and push ups. I can't think of a better way to kick start my training.

Of note, reading Sihing's Chervenka's blog where he mentioned me and others helped motivate me to write this blog. Writing blogs helps motivate those of us that need a little extra push, thanks Sihing!

Mr. Repay
Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Evaluation

This blog is over a week old and forgot to post in on my personal blog page.

"Tomorrow is a big day for me. Tomorrow I get evaluated in the field and I am a little nervous. These past months have all about learning and getting tested and evaluated. I can tell you that I am looking forward to putting tomorrow behind me.

 I can tell you that I am getting a little tired of being evaluated every single day. However this brings into perspective my kung fu. I know one day I will be grading for my  black belt. One day I will be in front of all of those Sifu's proving to them that I am good enough to earn my black black.  Every day that I am in the kwoon training I know that I am being evaluated. I am being evaluated not only on test days or when it's time to test for a stripe or a belt but I am being evaluated every time I step on those mats. I am being evaluated by how I carry my self in the community, how I represent our school, every day is a day for evaluation.

Tomorrow is a another day, another day of evaluation. I will wake up tomorrow and embrace this opportunity."

Mr.Repay
Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Structure

I have always known that structure is important to my kung fu but also in my life.  I have struggled with implementing consistent structure in my training. I have very big highs and very big lows in my training.  Structure is a way to help smooths these highs and lows and it is something that I have started to implement this past week.  I am starting with something small and will build upon this day by day.  What is the easiest thing to do that takes very little time to do and would be an obvious starting point...?  Push up and sit ups.

I have begun to get back to building my structure by doing my daily requirement of 130 sit ups and push ups as soon as I get up in the morning.  So far I have done this for the past 4 days, incremental progression!

Ian Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu
Stony Plain, Alberta

Struggling...

Where to start?  Well the past four weeks have been the most intense and stressful weeks that I can ever remember.  Not only am I away from home in South Carolina, the training is something that is incredibly intense.  Recently I finished up the first phase of my training and maintained one of the highest overall averages in the class.  I am proud of that but it came at a price.

When I was home last, I was able to stop into the kwoon and made it to the I Ho Chuan meeting.  That was an amazing meeting and I was so happy to share my journey and to “re charge” after being away.  However, when I returned to SC my training there increased in intensity by almost 100%.  I wasn’t expecting this and I shed everything that would interfere with my Michelin training.  

As a result I stopped my kung fu training.  I stopped doing and recording my sit ups and push ups.  I stopped doing my forms, I stopped everything including blogging.  Blogging is the MOST important aspect of the I Ho Chuan in my mind and I stopped writing.  I have no excuses and actually I am ashamed and angry with my failure.  I had every good intention of keeping up and at the minimum maintain where I was.  I FAILED, I failed to even do the very basic of basics.  I am feeling very lonely and out of touch with my Kwoon and training mates.  I have lost that connection that to me is so important and seeing the team train and prepare for the lion/dragon dance really got me down.  Before I left I was part of the team, I was part of the demo’s and I felt like a contributing part of the team and now I feel quite the opposite. 

I am sooooo very proud of the team and all that they have done to get ready and perform today.  I have decided that I am going to start writing again and to get back to my Kung Fu training.  It is going to be a long road back to where I was before I left but I am going to start today.  I am going to start small and build upon every day. 

If I go silent, please give me a nudge!

Ian Repay

Student Of Silent River Kung Fu

Eye for detail - part 2

I wanted to write about this topic as it's very relevant to my journey.  I am currently involved in the most intense and most in depth training that I have ever experienced.  Many people have compared this level of training to an abbreviated University master program.

Due to the intensity and type of information covered the "eye for detail" is so incredibly important.  I have never been that person that has the attention span nor the desire to pay attention to the details.  However I have no other choice but to continue to work on developing it here in South Carolina.  I just took another exam and I got caught not reading some questions thoroughly and as a result I lost some points on the exam.  I am really disappointed in myself as my focus this past week is to slow down and really focus on the details.  I kind of liken this to the progression of our Kung Fu that our Sifu's talk about.  So many of us (including myself) want to go straight to the realism.  We don't take enough time to really understand the technique as we want to go and show our strength and realism.  Well this is the same thing that I am experiencing here.  I know the material that is being tested, I am just not at times having that eye for detail.  I need to continue to be mindful of my kung fu training and keep applying it to my training here.

I can say that if it were not for my level of Kung Fu training, I would have much lower scores.  My kung Fu is serving me and this has been one of those "a ha" moments again.  I am so grateful for my training and I am seeing every day how my kung fu is serving me.

Mr. Ian Repay
Student Of Silent River Kung Fu

Week one in the books

We the first week is in the books down here in SC.  What a week it has been!  Never have I ever been exposed to soooooo much information in such a short period of time.  It is an amazing the level of training that Michelin provides to the new hires in the PLNA division.  I have been on boarded a few times in my career and have on boarded many reps that I have hired.  Nothing even comes close to Michelin and the program they are putting us through.  Sure there are lots of technical aspects to learn but the other important aspect of this training is to build strong, long lasting relationships with each other.  We are all going to be going into the field when we are done and we are all going to be doing the same things.  Solid relationships will be vital when we need to lean on each other for support.  Learning to build solid genuine relationships with our team will also help us to understand the importance of building good relationships with our customers.  

On a different subject, I am really sad that I am going to be missing the boot camp this weekend.  I went last year and it was a day to remember.  It was incredibly hard but at the same time it was so rewarding.  I hope all of the students that attend the boot camp this weekend take time to enjoy the experience and take some time to reflect upon the benefits of the boot camp.

Mr. Ian Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Teamates

There are 20 other people that are training with me down here in South Carolina.  They come from across the US and one other is from Canada.  We all have varied backgrounds and none of us have any experience in the trucking industry or tire industry.  Michelin wants it this way so that they can indoctrinate us in their culture and philosophy on how they want to got to market.  The training program is incredibly intense and I have never experienced anything like it before.

The instructors on day one stressed that we should and would need to come together as a team in order to succeed.  They talked about how we need to support each other and help the ones that are struggling.  We are responsible for each other and if one fails we all take a share in that responsibility.

Last night a bunch of got together after supper to study for todays upcoming test.  We all pulled together, asked each other questions, helped with the answers and had a few laughs along the way.  In three short days 20 complete strangers have come together and have started to create friendships.  We have come together with one goal in mind, to succeed and succeed not only as individuals but as a team.

Mr. Ian Repay
Student of Silent River Kung Fu
Stony Plain, Alberta

Second Day...

Well my second day has come and gone here in South Carolina.  It was a much more intense day than the first and I was expecting that.  However, when I have done something in the same industry for 15 years you tend to learn a thing or two.  Here, this is completely new to me.  I have much more empathy now for the reps that I had hired in the past that didn't have bakery industry experience.

Day three here I come!

I completed the following training today.

300 situps
150 push ups
5 form reps

ran 4.5 km's

Mr. Ian Repay
Student of Silent River Kung Fu.

Engagment

This is the word that was used over and over again during my first day down here in South Carolina.  “stay engaged, stay engaged, stay engaged” was talked about and how important it was if you wanted to be successful.  Sifu Brinker has talked about this from the start of the year and how important it was for our kung fu and the process if we wanted to see results.  I kind of got it but it is making more sense as I see it being applied in my professional life like today.  Other things we have trained in the Kwoon is to be mindful and having an eye for detail.  Again during my first day down here these EXACT same things were stressed to us and it was like a huge wake up call for me.  I have been working on attention to detail and an eye for detail in my kung fu and have been applying to my work life. I am again seeing what we are learning in our Kwoon being applied outside of the kwoon and it is really amazing to see how our kung fu training is being applied in my life outside of the Kwoon. 

I want to keep track of the training I am doing down here and will include it in my blogs.  So here is what I accomplish today.

130 sit ups

140 push ups

3 sets of 20 leg lifts with 80 pounds of resistance (weight machine training)

3 sets of 5 dips

3 sets of 20 chest presses with 100 pounds of resistance (weight machine training)

Ran 2.5 km’s in 8 min.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Empathy

This is something that I have thought about for the past while.  Sifu Brinker talked about this at length during one of our I Ho Chuan meetings.  Empathy…what does that mean to me?  It means that I need to understand what any one person is feeling and experiencing.  It means in simplified terms to “walk a mile in their shoes” to fully understand as best I can understand what they are feeling.  When I think back on certain training days in the kwoon, I reflect back on our warm ups in particular.  Warm ups should be a WARM UP not a way for us to improve our push up numbers at the expense of the students we are working with and instructing.  I can tell you that there have been times that I have internally groaned when the person is called up to lead the warm up.  I just know that they will take advantage of the warm up to either improve their numbers or just want to make the class work extra hard for what ever reason. There are times for a really hard warm up, such as one time in the San Shou class.  At this particular class the point was to exhaust the students so that we understood what it was like to have to mentally adapt to an exhausted body.  Makes perfect sense and I totally understood when Sifu explained the rational after class was done.

Empathy…I don’t have enough…I have been one of those students that have lead a warm up to improve my numbers.  I have lead a warm up with the intention of seeing how hard I could push the students that I know are not as in as good a shape as I am. 

However, since that last meeting I have changed my perspective, I am gained some empathy.  I now lead a warm up with empathy in my mind for those that I am there to assist and work with.  When I bow in and bow out for class I ask my self these two questions, “where am I and what am I doing”, I now add to this “who am I here to help”.  These three questions that I ask myself ever time I bow in and bow out have helped me to be mindful of why I am here and who am I here to help.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Stony Plain, Alberta

Change and no excuses!

I have been quite on the blogging front for far too long.  I can go into details as to why I feel I am justified in this but there is no justification for not blogging.  I dropped the ball and this is 100% my fault.  It only takes less than 20 minutes to write and post my blog and I can tell you that I have wasted many more minutes than this recently.  I have no excuses and I know I better, it’s all about routine and sticking to it.  I have struggled with this in my past and I recognize that it is a weakness that I need to improve upon going forward.

This takes me into the change portion of this blog.  I have made a monumental change in my working career.  I have been a professional baker my entire adult life and I have made a decision to move out of this area into a completely different field.  I am leaving my comfort zone and leaving everything I have ever known.  However I am going to adapt to this new industry and work really hard to apply the things that have made me successful in my baking career into this new venture.  I am extremely excited to be joining one of the best companies in the world and I get started this Monday.  I am going to take everything I have learned from my kung fu and apply it to my training in my new role.  Things like “eye for detail” will be very important as I am starting three months of training before I even touch my own territory.  This “eye for detail” is critical to our kung fu as this is essential to improving and achieving not only our black belt but must be present and developed in order for us to continue to improve for the rest of our lives. 

I am going to take what I have learned in the Kwoon and will continue to apply it like I have never done before. 

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Father's Day

This past Father’s Day I took some time to reflect upon my own father and what he has given me over my 35 years of life.  What my father taught me over all of these years are things I have used and will continue to use for the rest of my life.

My father is a great man that taught me the value of hard work.  He taught me to work hard for the things I wanted most in life.  My father was a man that worked hard his entire life to provide for his family.  Growing up I was never without anything that I needed.  There were things that I wanted but those things were items that really didn't matter all that much. 

I learned from him the values of dedication and an eye for detail.  You have to understand that my father loves collecting all sorts of things like coins, hockey cards, baseball cards and various sports memorabilia.  Now back to this eye for detail, my father will spend hours looking through his coins, looking for imperfections that most people wouldn't even see.  You see my father has an incredible eye for detail and I can relate his expertise in his field to Sifu Brinker in his.  They both have spent many years developing an eye for detail that is so far ahead of their peers. 

This eye for detail is something that is not inherently in my character.  It’s something that I have to continue to work toward developing in my kung fu.  Everyday when I am training, I am starting to look for things that I never looked for before.  I am starting to develop an eye for detail that my father has had for so many years.

To Father, thank you for all that you have done for me.  I know I wasn't the easiest on you over some of those years.  However, I love you very much and I so appreciate all that you have done for me.  My only wish is that I can be as great a father to my children as you have been to my sister and I.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu.

Stony Plain, Alberta.

Demo & parade #2 and BBQ!

This past weekend was our second parade and our second demo and for me my very first lion dance.  The parade was much shorter than the previous one in Stony Plain the week before.  I am grateful for that as it took my legs a number of days to recover.  I have come to realize that I need to be in much better shape than I am right now.  I used to look at Kung Fu as a way of getting into shape when I first started.  Now I feel that I need extra conditioning to get the most out of my Kung Fu.  The lion dance this weekend proved to me that I have a long way to go in regards to my fitness level but I am very grateful that I have realized this now and have time to work on improving it. 

The demo itself was very very good and I think it was a shade better than the one we did in Stony Plain.  Now for me personally it was not as good.  I lost my way half way through my double chuck form.  However I did recover, improvised a bit and I think I finished strong.  I know that no one in the audience knew that I screwed up but the thing is, I knew and that bothers me… 

I will keep working on my form and will be adding the rest of it from here on in.  I am looking forward to the Canada Day demo and will be step up if no one else does.  I know that there are teammates that have yet to be in the demo so I would step aside and give them an opportunity. 

I want to continue with the lion dancing as I really enjoyed it.  I was extremely nervous as I didn't want to screw up.  However I pushed that aside and did the best I could and I am very pleased that I stepped up and did it!  Also to improve my leg strength and cardio I have added biking to my exercise routine.  Yesterday I tuned up my son’s bike and pushed through about 3 km.  I will keep adding to this total every time I take my bike out.

Last but far from least, thanks to Sifu Lindstrom for the great BBQ at his company's shop.  It was really great meeting up as a team after we were done.  A great way to just hang out and continue to build the team comradery.

Mr. Ian Repay

Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

Stony Plain, Alberta.

Parade,demo,kids class, WOW!

What an amazing weekend!  The parade was a ton of fun and I spent most of it starring at the ground and hunched over!  My quads are stil sore and it has been three days after. I now totally understand Sifu Lindstrom when he tells me that lion dancing will improve my stances, no kidding!!!!  Also I now understand when he's says "your pretty much blind in the lion head" he wasn't kidding as I almost ran over numerous kids along the parade route.  I loved the lion and I can't wait to do it again in Onoway this weekend with Sifu Lindstrom.

I thought the demo went pretty well but I feel my Lao Gar sucked pretty bad. I have lots of work to do but this demo has helped narrow my focus a lot.  My double chuck form is a long away from being any good but I am happy I didn't drop any or accidently have fly in anyones direction.  Great job team and let's do it again this weekend!

Mr.Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Stony Plain, Alberta

Crossroads

All of us have been here before in one way or another.  There are many reasons that we come to a crossroads in our life. 

Well I am at one right now, I am at a crossroads and I am unsure what to do.  I have done the “pro’s and con’s” thing and still I can’t decide what road to take.  You see I have been on this same road for years and I am comfortable to an extent with what is on this road.  I am familiar with all the bumps and curves in this road and this gives me comfort.  If I choose the other road, it is filled with many unknowns, potential pot holes, blind curves and other hazards that I may not be expecting along the way.  This new road is something very different to me in many ways and in some ways the same.  So why is it such a difficult decision to make?  Why can’t I seem to make up my mind what I want to do?  I have had many people give me advice on what they think I should do yet this isn’t their life and any decision I make has no affect on them.  I appreciate all the advice, but I think maybe I have been getting a little too much of it and perhaps some of these people are giving me advice to push their own agenda in some small way.

I think what is needed is some quite time along with some meditation.  This has always helped me focus my mind and focus on what I need to do.  Thanks to my Kung Fu training clearing my mind and calming my mind has become easier. 

Mr. Ian Repay

Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

This is too cool.

This just happened yesterday and I have been thinking about it ever since then. I was meeting my friend for lunch at a restaurant on Whyte Ave. He was outside waiting for me and when I walked up he made a motion toward my nose with his fingers. Now here's the cool part, without thinking and just purely reacting I blocked his hand motion and immediately struck to his face with a vertical punch that I pulled just millimeters from the tip of his nose. He was shocked and moved back almost a foot as he thought I was going to punch him in the nose. What I think is soooooooo cool is that my body reacted without me thinking!

I have always wondered how what we are learning would apply in real life. It has been something that I have pondered for quite a while now and wow was I amazed how my body moved and reacted to what I have been taught. To me this was one of those "a ha" moments and I think it's pretty cool to see how my training has integrated itself into my life.

Mr. Ian Repay
Student Of Silent River Kung Fu.

No Excuses

I have not been blogging for a couple of weeks now and I have no excuse for this.  I know that I needed to be doing this and I know that I am letting not only myself down but also my team mates.  I have at times struggled with laziness in my life.  Not sure why, not sure why I let this happen?  However I have known that I struggle with this.  In my mind I tell myself “don’t worry, you can do it tomorrow” or “not that urgent, deal with it when you want to” not when I needed to.

I realized and have realized for some time that this is an area that needs improvement in my life.  I have improved upon this greatly over the past couple of years and I attribute the UBBT process for that.  However there is lots of room for continued improvement.  I am going to keep working on this and will use this process to continue to improve.  Blogging every week is the most critical and easiest measuring stick to see how I am doing.  As Master Brinker says to us over and over “if you’re not blogging, you’re probably not doing the rest of your requirements”.  All I have to say is Master Brinker is 100% correct!  However, that doesn’t mean that I give up.  That means that I have realized where I have failed and I will pick myself up, dust off my back side and get back to it!

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Stony Plain, Alberta 

What is an artisan, what is artisanal what is a martial artist?

I want to sort of continue with the diet theme for this week.  We are tracking what we are eating and blogging about the journey for the month of April so why not continue with it?  I am sure that anyone that has read my last blog post will attest to, I am a proud baker.  Now let’s for a moment explore what this over used word “artisan” really means Vs what main stream retailers and the media has made it out to be.

Definition of “artisan” Via the Oxford dictionary states – “a worker in a skilled trade, especially one that involves making things by hand”.  To further elaborate on this would be to get the definition of “artisanal” as it applies to any artisan trade.  The Oxford definition of “artisanal” is - “relating to or characteristic of an artisan - (of a product, especially food or drink) made in a traditional or non-mechanized way:artisanal cheeses.  So when I think of the definition of the word “artisan and artisanal” my thoughts are of a hand crafted product made in small batches by a skilled tradesperson who takes great cake in making things by hand, a “one of a kind” type product”.  Now I am going to direct your attention to my passion which is baking. I want you to think about how many times you have seen the word “artisan bread” when you walk through a grocery store?  I can tell you for a fact that every large supermarket uses this “marketing terminology” for the perception that it employs to the consumer.  I can also tell you that most every loaf of bread in that is marketed in this way does not fit the Oxford dictionaries definition of artisan or artisanal in any way.   

Consumers have been duped by mass media marketing into thinking that the products they are buying are made by artisans or are artisanal in nature are quite the opposite.  They are mass produced products made in large “bread factories” with little to no “made by hand” applications.  How can this be artisan or artisanal?  Well it’s not; it’s just marketed this way to get you to think in your rush home after work that you are buying something that is good for you.  Well in fact that is quite the opposite, these large bakeries are putting dough conditioners, preservatives and chemicals into the dough to speed the process as fast as possible in order to produce as many loaves of “artisan bread” that they possibly can in a single shift!  These chemicals such as SSL (sodium stearoyl lactylate), azodicarbonamide, DATEM (diacetyl tartaric esters of mono & diglycerides) are added to the dough to speed up and strengthen the dough during this high speed process. I still can't even properly pronounce them or spell them correctly and yet they are in our food supply...

“High speed process”… artisan and artisanal… in the same sentence?  How can than this be?  When we reflect on the definitions of these two words, can they be used in the same sentence that “high speed process” is used?  No, but that is the truth behind what you as a consumer are buying and what these supermarkets are selling to you.

When I wrote my blog last week, I never really touched on what it means to call yourself an “artisan” and what it really means to produce “artisanal product”.  The products that I make, I can proudly call “artisanal” as they are made in very small batches, made completely by hand and each loaf is unique.  I use only the best ingredients that I can find, the process is very long (upwards of 24 to 48 hours) before the product is ready to be consumed.  This dedication to the very best ingredients and to the very best process will in most cases allow people who are “gluten sensitive” to be able to eat my bread.  When I set out to do this was I concerned about “gluten free”?  Not at all.  I was most concerned about producing the very best bread that I knew how to make.  I wanted to take all of my years of experience in the trade, everything I learnt and apply it to my craft.  I wanted to make a loaf of bread that most people have never tasted, one that was of very high quality and something I could be proud of.

When I think of martial arts and what it is to be a “martial artist” I think the very same things apply.  I see similarities between the two.  Like any artisan, we are applying ourselves to be the very best kung fu martial artist we can.  We are learning our trade from masters in the kwoon just like I learned from masters in my trade.  It took me many years to get my level of craft to where it is and the same can be said about kung fu.  I applied and dedicated myself to learning and seeking out everything I could from people I respected so that I could be the very best baker I could be.  The same is with my kung fu training; I am seeking out and learning from every Sifu in the school as well as my peers. 

It is this dedication that will eventually lead you to being a true artisan in your chosen craft.  This is the dedication that I will need in order to become the very best kung fu martial artist that I can.  This process of mastery is the process that I have followed as an artisan bakery long before I had ever heard or read “Mastery by Stewart Emery”.   When I reflect upon what Mr. Emery has written about Mastery, I see pieces of what I have applied to my professional craft.  I see area’s that I need to improve upon, but I now see a road map of how to be a better artisan and a better martial artist.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Stony Plain, Alberta

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