Sourounding myself with positive people

I've started to see the impact that the people I souround myself have on me.  I didn't think that people could have that much positive and negative impact.  I see now that I only want to souround myself with people that truly care, share the same morals and ethics as me.  I find myself wanting to distance myself from certain people that have a negative attitude.  They bring me down and they don't have any value.  I don't want this to come across as extremely cold but I've realized that my time here is finite.  If I truly want to live the life that I want I need to live it with people that are living the same way as me.  Kung Fu has ingrained it's self into me so deeply that I can't ever unwind it from my soul even of I wanted to.  My wife has seen the positive impact on me as a husband.  My kids see me in a different and better light than ever before.  I owe this all to them and SRKF and the people that I've trained with and train with every day.  You see the people that choose to stay and make king Fu part of thier life are the people I want in my life.

Mr. Ian Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Emotional Bank Account

I've had this topic in my drafts for a number of weeks.  Today seemed to be the right time to write about it as Mr. Bjorkquist and I had a good conversation about it during open training.  

The concept comes from Stephen Covey.  It's about interactions with people and building relationships.  Consider this, if you spend all of your money before you get paid, do you have anything left until then?  Maybe, what if you have an overdraft.  Let's say you have an overdraft and you keep withdrawthing are you now in a negative balance?  Yes we are and this philosphosy can be applied to realtionships.  Everytime we do what we say,  we make a deposit and increase our balance within that relationship.  Help that person with a project, deposit.  We should always be working toward increasing our balance with people.  But what happens when we don't keep our word or lie for example?  We then have made a withdrawal in that relationship.  Same thing applies when we insult someone, don't show empathy etc.  Do we always know when we're making deposits and withdrawals?  No. There are times, especially when we're not empathetic towards that person they perceive our actions as a withdrawal.  While we saw it as a deposit.  I've found that if I apply mindful empathy then I'm likely to make more deposits than withdraws.  

I love this concept and I'm starting to have it present in my mind every day.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Martial Art's isn't only about winning in the cage.

I've been watching a lot of YouTube recently as I'm trying to get some ideas for my bokken form.  As you start searching for videos Google gets to start recommending videos it thinks are related.  Some of the suggested videos are titled "why traditional martial arts don't work".  You have a "guy" talking about why the traditional martial arts don't work on the street or in the cage.  He bases all of his arguments on this philosophy which is knocking out or submitting your apponent inside the cage.   He shows how a couple of  "traditional martial artists" are beaten against a MMA fighter.  What he's showing in my opinion is just fighting.  It doesn't show the other intangible benefits of traditional martial arts.  

The traditional martial arts have taught me how to live a better life.  How to reduce my ego.  They've taught me empathy and how to become a better man.  Do I think I can get into a cage and beat a guy who's only trained to punch, kick and grapple but may lack empathy?  No I don't think so and that's ok with me.  I love my traditional Kung Fu training because of the exact opposite of this.  It's not all about kicking and punching, it's about being a well rounded, confident and overall better person.

Mr. Ian Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Happy New Year, bring on the Rat team!

When it comes to finding inspirations to write about it this is an easy one.  It was an amazing night where two men become our newest Sifu's.  Congratulations to Sifu Sollinger and Sifu Ward.  I had the honour of seeing both of them come through the ranks over the years.  I remember helping teach some classes when Sifu Sollinger came through as an orange belt.  I could see then that he had the desire and mental fortitude to earn his black belt.  

This night was also kind of odd for me.  You see I've been part of the I Ho Chuan team in years past and I was also part of a couple of dragon dances and demo teams.  This year I wasn't as I came back to the school a few months ago.  So to see the demo, the dragon dance and everyone so engaged to make the night what it was, was stunning.  However because I wasn't part of it, I felt a little like an outsider.  I did jump in and organize the serving of the food and this was my way of contributing to the evening and it helped. 

This year is going to bring opportunities to get involved and lead.  I'm excited as we have a strong team of veterans and rookies.  The success of this team will be engagement, leadership and consistency.  We have the tools for success already in our hands.  The success of the team will be how we consistently use the tools, and support each other. 

I'm so excited for this year, bring on the Rat team. 

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Family

Being part of the Rat team for the 2020 I Ho Chuan I've started to reflect upon the importance of my family.  Even though this is my journey, I can't be successful without the support of my family.  In prior years I dove into this journey without much regard to my wife's feelings. I didn't share with her how important this was to me and more importantly why I was on this journey.  As a result there was a lot of resentment from her because of the amount of time I was spending away from her.  

I can't stress enough that this journey MUST include those people with whom you share your life with.  They need to be there to help pick you up when your down and cheer your successes. Going into this year I've shared with my wife what my personal requirements are and why I've decided to undertake this journey. She now understands the "why". 

She's happy for me because she sees how happy it makes me and how Kung Fu has helped me become a better man, husband and father.  

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu.

Mortality

With the recent passing of Sifu Randy Shipalesky I'm reflecting on my own mortality.  I've taken life for granted as long as I can remember.  It's only recently (past year or two) that I've started to realize that life can end at any moment.  Maybe it's because I'm over 40 and I'm thinking to myself that there's less ahead of me than behind me.  

I've really started to put into perspective what's important to me in my own life.  Some of those things are my children, my wife, my happiness.  What I've also realized that my job, my title at that job and chasing money isn't at the top anymore.  I have a colleauge that when asked the question "what does money mean to you" responded with, slavery.  I was more than surprised with that response but at this point in my life I'm understanding what he means.  By chasing material items that in this world "shows off" your "status" in today's society you become a slave to money.  That used to be me and to a much lesser extent it still is.  However I'm no longer chasing money for those reasons.  

I've come to realize that time spent with the things that mean the most to me will bring me the most satisfaction and love in my life.  It's taken a while to get to this point but it's never too late.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu

Personal Victory

This a Stephen Covey concept that simply says that we should have a personal victory every day.  In order to have a personal victory you have to goals and accomplishments for each day.  I've been setting aside one hour each morning between 7am and 8am to focus on what's important to me and what I want that days personal victory to be.  I focus on spending at least 30 min on Duolingo learning Spanish.  The other 30 minutes are for push ups, sit ups and form practise.  At the end of my hour I record what I did on my phone and update my totals.  This is my personal victory and I did it before my day began.

Mr. Repay

Student of Silent River Kung Fu