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