Angelina's Throwing Punches

Every time before Kung Fu class I get cold feet.  I start thinking up reasons not to go.  I have some really good ones such as:

• We can't actually afford it (this might be true and we'll just have to play it by ear).

• I didn't get around to giving myself a pumice pedicure and someone is going to refuse to practice with me once they see my feet.

• I am in the middle of starting a revolution and I need to whittle myself a few penny whistles.

• I am busy managing my chin hair situation.

• My dog ate my foot.

• I'll accidentally punch someone in the crotch and get sued for emotional damages, which we can't afford.

I wonder how many times I'll have to go before this mistrust wears thin enough for me to slough it off with a little cognitive behavioral therapy?  I went this evening with big misgivings.  Which went away as soon as I got busy doing exercises with sticks.  Weapons!  Sticks that we learn to use defensively with each other in a slow motion of curving flowing orchestrated deflective moves that are both pretty and powerful.  I can feel the utility of the stick in my hands and they remember having the foil in their grip and it's as natural as quilting by hand.

I have a perverse love of weapons that you use to fight in hand to hand combat. 

So, remember that long post I wrote five minutes ago in which I discovered how I need to let go of old pain and rewrite what I want from people?  It all ties in.  I had this all on my mind tonight as I sweated horribly while engaging in stick fights.  Or I would have, if I hadn't been so busy using my body in new ways and not letting my fear of strangers and other people's sweat get in the way of learning what just might be the coolest things I've ever physically done.

Fighting physically is primal.

It satisfies on a previously obscured level of myself.

The Kung Fu is has opened something that Fencing couldn't.  Tonight we practiced the jab-cross-hook which is basically a boxing move.  It felt good to smack the leather paddles with my fists.  (I may have a lot of repressed anger to work out.)  It feels honest, this physical self defense discipline.  It feels like getting down to brass tacks.

As soon as I start doing what the instructor tells me to do I let go of my worries about not being capable and I just do it.  I make mistakes as I practice and I don't care because my ego flies out the window once I get in the fray. 

So what I was feeling while I was throwing punches tonight was that as the old cracked useless pain is let go, there is now something to answer its empty place with. 

Useful transformations are never quick.

I thought I was ready for a different transformation at the beginning of the year only to discover that I hadn't gotten to the real heart of it all yet, that there was such a great distance to stumble across with my shoes tied together.  I wasn't seeing things that needed to be seen.  Even now I may not be at the very core.  That's alright.  I'll get there.

Angelina's throwing punches.