Osu!

I found this funny video game on the internet called "Osu!". Basically, it's like Dance Dance Revolution, or Guitar Hero, but instead of using a guitar or a dance mat, you score points by clikcing your mouse. If you're not familiar with DDR or Guitar Hero, allow me to explain a little bit. 'Osu!' is a scroll-based interactive video game that incorporates music, rhythm, and mouse-clicking. Perhaps that's not a good enough explanation, but the game isn't the point, it's the TITLE that got me.

Being somewhat familiar with Japanese culture and language, I've encountered the word "osu!" many times...but for some reason, I never thought to research its meaning. Whenever 'osu!' is used, it's usually a short, loud cry that suggests something positive, kind of like the Army's 'Hooah'. I just assumed that 'osu!' was some sort of agreement...and then I said it out loud a few times and realized that it sounds a lot like sensei's "ICE!" kiai. And then I thought, "Wait a minute...'osu!' kind of IS a kiai..."

So, with interest, I typed 'the meaning of osu!' in the Google search box and, low and behold, the first webpage that I found was a page for Kyokushin karate explaining what 'osu!' means...in karate terms. Needless to say, my interest-meter went up about thirty notches. Here's what I found out.

Apparently 'osu!' is more than a kiai. Much more. The website's author first explains the practical uses of 'osu!' while in class:

["...in Kyokushin, every single question is answered with 'osu'. Every greeting is osu...when performing basics in class, every technique is often accompanied by a loud 'osu!'. When practicing free sparring and your opponent lands a good, solid technique, you say 'osu' to acknowledge their skill. As a measure of respect, knockdown fighters at a tournament bow and say 'osu' to the front, to the refferee, and to each other, before and after the fight..."]
 

So, 'osu!' is used in greeting and in parting, in reverence and encouragement, as a kiai, as a way of saying, "I understand", and in every positive demonstration of the indomitable spirit. Wow. That's a lot of meaning to place on one word!

And if that weren't enough, the writer goes on to explain the spiritual meaning of 'osu!', of which I will paraphrase in order to keep from quoting the entire webpage.

Basically, 'Osu!' is THE word to represent and explain, in very short terms, every facet of the indomitable spirit. The word itself is made up of the Japanese words 'oshi', which means 'push' and 'shinobu', which means 'endure'. According to the writer, 'osu' means, ["...patience, determination, appreciation, respect, and perseverance."].

'Osu' means pushing through the pain. It means giving everything you have, and then giving just a little bit more. It means bettering yourself by searching for the deeper meaning of martial arts; in matters of both technique and spirit. It means finding the courage to get back up after you've been thrown, and finding the courage to land a good hit in sparring instead of running away.

My sister once asked me, "Gosh, Becky! Is everything about martial arts?!" I told her that no, not everything is about martial arts...but martial arts is about everything. 'Osu' is too, I think.

If you really look hard, you will find that any lesson which can be learned, can be learned on the mat. Of course, that's a very in-your-face and straightforward way of learning, but while a good reverse-punch is thrown with strength and power, it is equally thrown with control and grace. It's powerful but gentle at the same time.

'Osu' means that the phrase, "Perhaps I will get there someday..." becomes, "I will get there in time." The words, "I can't" become "I will".

'Osu' is martial arts. It is a one-word description of everything that martial arts is.
Finding my inner "osu" will definitely be a journey.

Martial Arts Refinery

I think that an interesting way to look at martial arts would be to think of it as a teacher. I once read a book that talked about personal 'master teachers', which were described as more esoteric and intangible things, such as emotions, id, and ego, but seriously, if you think about it, martial arts can also be thought of as a teacher.

Every time I step on the mat, I learn something. First I learn the obvious things that everybody else can see, such as kicks, throws, kata, and whatnot, but I also always learn something about myself, as well. Not everybody can see what I learn about myself, but I can see it, and I make it a priority to take those lessons and apply them to my life.

There's something about my martial arts journey, though, that I find sort of amusing, and that's my semi-obsessive want to know for sure that I've become a martial artist and not someone who just does martial arts. It's funny because I have this nagging feeling that, like with music, there is never a given point where one becomes a martial artist.

But see, that's not because martial arts doesn't change you. The name of our school is 'Martial Arts Refinery' and I used to think that the reason it's called 'Refinery' is because, as a martial artist, you are constantly refining your technique. There is no set destination; there is always something to learn and improve.

It's interesting that now I'm discovering that it's the other way around; martial arts refines you, too. It's an interesting relationship, though, because martial arts only teaches you what you want to know. Yes, it shows you everything about yourself; there are no secrets...but it never forces. Never pushes. You are the one who pushes. And why do you push? Because after a while, you realize that not pushing wouldn't be fair to yourself. That by not pushing, you are holding yourself back. Stunting your growth. It took me about five minutes to learn that on the mat, but it's taken me eighteen years to learn to start applying it to situations in my own life.

Anyway, I rambled. The reason that my semi-obsession with wanting to know when I've officially become a martial artist is funny is because it's an endless uphill climb. I find myself saying, "Okay, I got ___ belt, I must be a martial artist now!" and then something great happens and I learn something really great, that tops that achievement and I say, "Never mind, that doesn't make me a martial artist, this does." It's a great and wonderful up-cycle that, I think, never ends. Because the learning never ends. I will always learn something new and then I'll be forced to say it again: "Okay, now I'm a martial artist..."

It's as if I'll never be a martial artist, but I will always be one, at the same time.

Also, martial arts doesn't ask anything in return. There's nothing for it to gain from my learning, but there is infinite wisdom for me to gain through learning, refining, and being refined by it.

Anyway, I'm really glad that I'm doing it. Even if it scares me sometimes with its honesty and straightforwardness. Even when I have to say, 'next time, I'll be better'. The fact that I can say that at all is a teaching victory in and of itself.

Sparring and the art of not running away

Sparring is hard.

Yep. That's it; that's the whole entry. I'm done.
Nah, just kidding. But really, I've learned that sparring doesn't just come naturally; unless you're practiced in it (like with most things), you'll find yourself getting hit a lot. Unfortunately getting hit a lot is something that I try to avoid, naturally. 

Of course, with sparring, pain is unavoidable. Which I don't like. The only way to practice sparring is to get hit a lot. For someone like me, who is...well...not a big fan of pain, this creates a high-threat situation. In short, it freaks me out and I want to run away!
So basically, I'm a martial arts enthusiast that likes everything except...fighting.
Great...

But anyway, sparring is also hard because when you're in the moment, it's very easy for your mind to go completely blank. Conversely, it's also possible to have a complete overload of options where you're overwhelmed into inaction...and then you get hit. I think this is why repetition and refinement of a few choice techniques is extremely important.

While I was waiting to spar with Zach today, I was thinking about how I could set up an axe kick and completely surprise him, but my first priority is to not get hit. Of course, that itself is a recipe for inaction and...well, I lost that match, but my point is, I didn't do the axe kick because it was easier to do a front kick. Why? Not because I don't know how to do an axe kick; not because it was physically easier to do a front kick in that position, but because my mind went directly to the kick that I knew would deliver the results that I wanted. Axe kicks are flashy and are also very effective if done at the right moment, but there was absolutely no doubt in my mind that the front kick would've landed and scored me a point.

The axe kick might have given me the element of surprise, but I wasn't thinking about that. My mind went straight to whatever was at the front of my 'bag of tricks', as Sensei calls it. I suppose we could chalk that up to being in the moment, because when you get the adrenaline rush and your brain goes into overdrive, in any situation, thinking clearly is a very hard thing to do. There's hardly any time to think, "Okay, well this kick would be better than this kick in this situation" if the other guy is about to hit you. You're going to do the reflexive thing, and for me, that was the front kick and NOT the axe kick...Even though the axe kick might have been a better choice.

So, the reason that this entry is called "Sparring and the art of not running away" is because the first thing at the top of my list, at the moment, is to not get hit under any circumstance. This, I've found, is a recipe for disaster and I'm trying to change it. Or perhaps I'm not trying to change it, but I'm trying to think of ways to work around it. Changing instinct is extremely hard. Nobody wants to get hurt, no matter what they've trained themselves to do. It's the 'training yourself' thing that I'm struggling with.

I don't have to like getting hit, but I can teach myself to think away from instinct. Perhaps what I need to do is to practice applying the axe kick to more situations. Maybe I need to practice my crescent kicks and my hook kicks as often as I practice my front kicks. I need to find a way to make those other kicks reflexive. And maybe I need to practice getting hit so that I can better recognize the difference between a threatening and a non-threatening situation.

Truthfully, at this point, I'd rather run away from a sparring match than actually make a move. I'd rather block everything, time-out, and have nobody score...but that's unrealistic and it defeats the purpose of sparring, which is to practice applying what you know.
And since getting hit is unavoidable, I suppose there's no point in being hesitant.

But anyway, martial arts is teaching me a lot about courage. And about learning how to think away from instinct. Every time I practice sparring, I learn something. It's win-win, even when I get hit. That doesn't make getting hit feel any better, but at least I know that there's always something to gain from it.

I suppose it's all a matter of perspective.

Go green or die trying!

Today was definitely a day for learning experiences. I'm usually sore from karate, but this time I'm a different kind of sore.
We had our belt test today and I didn't make it to green belt.

I can't pretend that I didn't consider the possibility that I might not make it, since I've been sick for the past five days and am definitely not at my best...but when it actually happened, it was a different thing. It was like the difference between back-falling on purpose and having to actually back-fall. I really thought that I'd be able to pull through! I guess I should've known that it would be too much when I started getting winded from practicing the high-dragon stance. That should've been a red flag. It's just a stance.

Anyway, I learned two things today. First, I learned that my health is the most important thing. I got so into it; I wanted that green belt so much that if Sensei hadn't stopped my test halfway through, I probably would've passed out. I might have even had an asthma attack and ended up in the hospital. I let my emotions get in the way of my better judgment and it could've had some serious consequences if Sensei hadn't intervened. 

It was irresponsible of me to put myself in that kind of danger over a belt test. I need to be able to trust myself to stop if it's too much for my body to handle. There's a difference between pushing yourself and being stupid and I was stupid tonight.

Besides, if I die from training, I can't train anymore! And I don't ever want to stop.

The second thing I learned today is that I am not invincible. Emotionally. That is, I was very disappointed when Sensei told me that he was going to stop my test. It's not a good idea to get upset when you can't breathe, because it just makes everything worse. I was a little bit worried that if I started crying, I'd stop breathing. So I didn't cry. And that's okay, because a few minutes later, I got over the initial frustration and I was alright..

Anyway, I'm a little bruised from this; a little bit disappointed...but it's nothing I can't handle.
After all...it's just a belt. Just a different color.

Nothing to get myself put in the hospital over!

Breathe

This might sound kind of obvious and pointless to say, but it's really important to breathe. When we stretch, we breathe a certain way. When we kiai, it's a loud expulsion of breath. When we've been doing a lot of kicks and we start getting winded, Sensei often has us take a few seconds to just breathe.

I think it's important to take time out to breathe in real life, too. It's really easy to get wrapped up in school, work, and the other kinds of stress that occupy our daily lives. Sometimes we forget to breathe. It's so easy to just forget. Breathing is automatic; most of us don't have to think about it. We just do it. And we only take time out to focus on breathing when we think we really, really need it.

After all, why should I just sit here and breathe while I could be getting something accomplished? I can multi-task, after all. Isn't it just a waste of time?

A few months ago I might've answered that question 'yes', but I've learned that the opposite is true. It's not a waste of time; breathing is a way to help us reboot or reconnect with what's going on in our bodies and minds. Sometimes it's easy to forget where and who we are...taking a second to breathe really helps with that. We, as humans, seem to feel the need to always go, go, go. I know that I like to be at the top of my game, three steps ahead of the last "ICE!". I like to DO stuff on the mat, and I like to do it with enthusiasm and excitement.

But even so, it's immensely important to stop and catch your breath so that you don't get hurt.

My dad once told me that, "If you're not breathing, nothing else matters."
He's an EMT, so he would say that...

Boldly go

I can actually feel myself getting stronger, physically and mentally. I wish that I could really put into words how much I'm learning from Sensei and Zach and everybody at The Refinery. I'm learning fast, fast, fast. Even though it takes me a few minutes to get the 'feel' for what's going on in class sometimes, I feel like I'm becoming more confident and better every day. 

I've stopped taking one hour of instruction every other day and have bumped myself up to two hours. I like being able to interact with the other people in the second class. It's fun. Also, I like having the chance to help the younger students. I am by no means a master of anything, since martial arts is all about refinement (hence the school name: 'Martial Arts Refinery'), but helping teach actually helps me learn too.

I think I'm starting to learn something. A big part of being a martial artist is having confidence in your abilities. You can have all the skill in the world, all the technique in the world; you can have the fastest and most powerful roundhouse kick out there, but if you don't have the confidence to strike when it matters, what do you really have? I mean...At first I was absolutely terrified of the idea of hurting a classmate or myself while practicing, so everything I did was on the defensive side. When sparring or in randori I always kept my distance. I thought so much about how to avoid certain things that I never got a hit in.

Yesterday, we were working front leg sweeps and osoto-gari and at the end of class we had a 'randori tournament', as Sensei called it. The difference this time was that there was absolutely no way for me to keep my distance from Zach when we had our arms locked together. The idea of that freaked me out but I got over it quickly. I think I may have got my first hit in

I've realized that it's a lot easier to think straight and to act when I'm not in defensive mode and I actually try for an offensive move. Also, it's FUN to trip people.

Confidence. You've gotta go out there and do it. Don't freak out and don't overthink things. Just do it.
And if you do it wrong, it's alright because you have your whole life to get it right.

Don't get me wrong, sometimes it's good to be on the defensive. That comes in handy in real life situations.
But in the dojo, it's practice. And while we're training for real life situations, we're also there for other things...Like skill refinement, character building and fun. (And of course to get that back-stance right!)

So, I'm learning. It's easy to be unsure about learning new things, of course. But it's not like it's life-or-death if I don't get everything perfectly right the first time. I get too caught up in too many different details and overthink everything because I don't want to mess up. But I really can't focus on refining a technique if I never actually do it, whether it's correct the first time or not.

But anyway, rambling aside, I can tell that I'm getting stronger. It's really really cool in ways that are not possible to describe.

Therefore, I shall leave this entry here.

Tap when it hurts

Man, today was painful!

We did Aikido today. Usually I'm like, "Woo hoo, Aikido! I love Aikido!" because I enjoy arm-bars and wristlocks and submission. I dunno; maybe I'm crazy, but I usually get very excited when we learn Aikido stuff. But like with anything else, after doing the figure-four-arm-bar-elbow-pit-reversal-submission-death-throw ('FFABEPRSDT' for short) twenty times on each arm, I was beginning to hate life a little bit!

The move (which is actually just called 'Figure Four') starts out with an attacker throwing a punch at you. You're supposed to sidestep out of the way while giving them an arm-bar, then very quickly, you twist their arm up into a shoulder-lock and simply walk forward until they lose their balance and fall down.

Maybe I'm just a big complainer, but after we were finished with class, I could actually feel my joints throbbing and aching. Tomorrow I'm going to have to do a lot of stretching to make up for today.

I don't think I would've had such a problem if I had tapped out before Zach, my classmate, actually started to hurt me. I've found that when Zach is my partner, I get kind of competitive. When I'm working with Zach I feel like a big wimp if I complain about anything, so when he had me in the figure-four, even though he went too fast and over-extended both of my elbows and shoulders almost every time, I didn't tap. Even when it hurt, I didn't tap. Some people might be extremely proud of that, but now that I'm hurt, I'm not proud at all. I just hurt.


I should have tapped, but my pride won out over my better judgement. In martial arts, you're supposed to avoid injury. If it is possible to walk away from a fight without hurting anybody or getting hurt yourself, that is the ideal solution to the confrontation. Likewise, practice is not supposed to cause injury. If I had told Zach to slow down or to not push as hard, I might have been able to avoid over-extending my elbows and pulling the muscles in my shoulders.

This was a painful lesson to learn and it was unneccessary to allow myself to be injured just so that I could say, "Hey, look. I'm not a wimp." After all, who cares what other people think, right?

I confess that that doesn't work as well when I'm around people whose opinions matter to me. But I should've known better; Zach and Sensei are both great people whom I've trusted on many, many occasions. Sometimes I forget that they're my friends and that they aren't going to think less of me if I tap when it hurts.

I guess I just need reminding of that every now and then.
Hopefully I'll be able to skip the Motrin next time I need a reminder.