It’s Been A While

It’s been a while since I last posted on the blog. A lot has happened, the most important for me is the arrival of my first born, Ngo cao Vo (Marshall). That’s a real game changer, but I will find/make time for my training. It might be on pause and not the highlight of things right now, but I can’t stop martial arts training.

My Sifu is still developing his Chinese Stick Fighting Program. We haven’t gone over any new material, but he have me lead the first 30 minutes of class and goes over any key details that were missing from my explanation. I did express to Sifu regarding my concern of being his inheritor. I don’t have 40 years of Kung Fu experience, even when you add up all my years in Kendo, Muay Thai, BJJ and Kung Fu, it’s no where close. No one would be interested in learning my me. Hence, the reason I am teaching and he’s correcting me. He also said that I’m the one that has been working closely with him since he started the program. That I know it more than anyone else. That’s true and is comforting, but I will try my best to more.

There’s not a real draw for practitioners in the Chinese Stick Fighting Program. I think that makes Sifu a little bit disappointed, as we have reached out to other schools and offered to share our fees with them, but no one was really interested.

It doesn’t really bother me that we don’t have a large following yet. This gives us time to work things out. Fine tune it you can say. I won’t be at practice the rest of this month and maybe half of October, but by the time I get back, I do what to have a fencing/HEMA mask, and maybe some sort of heavy jacket. I think we need to start sparring, even if it’s extremely light. The sparring will help those who are learning want to fine tune their technique, and would keep them motivated to train. Sometimes I can see folks’ attention drift away during practice. Sparring would be a nice change.

We’ve been working more on the Cho Family Set (or now Animal Set) quite a bit. We’re still working on the first set, the mantis hands/fist. I’ve also learned some of the regular mantis set.

I finally learned all of the broadsword set. But what’s been really interesting and fun for me is learning the jian, the straight sword. I’ve been picking up that set much quicker than I did the broadsword.

I’m looking to get back to rolling and hitting pads in 2025. I also intend to start running more. Maybe do a half marathon in 2025. Meditate more. I’ve been slacking on meditating this year. I need to get back on the zafuton.

Action steps: make a schedule for meditating, set training and stance training. I just gotta do it.