Karen writes: Tai Chi
The children came home from the school holidays this afternoon, I have Saturday with them, Sunday we head down into Mooloo land for the predicted 4 hours of midwinter bike-riding. The girls will be happily occupied but I myself wont actually spend a lot of quality time with them before they re-start school.
So the part of my brain that always feels guilt about the apparent selfishness of my endurance training asks the question "why drag them off to Tai Chi on Saturday morning...wouldn't it be nice to have a leisurely start to the day?". Um...yes. Yes but...
Yes BUT the weekly session of Tai Chi seems to have kept my leg problems, particularly that nasty ITB, at bay since I started doing it. Yes BUT this week's training time is already down since I had a Monday evening meeting and missed out on spin class due to an overbooking on Thursday. Yes BUT I'm doing no other flexibility or strength training. Yes BUT I really want to get better at this Tai Chi thing, not just mimic the moves, I want to understand it.
Yes BUT. Sadly enough, if you have a busy life there actually has to be a degree of selfishness in order to be an endurance athlete, otherwise it just wouldn't happen. So tomorrow morning we will have a relatively relaxed start but will be out the door by 9am. We will meet up with the disparate group of mainly women at the local school, drink some sort of tea out of tiny cups, usually a new variety provided by instructor Stacey, and talk about whatever until called to order. The girls will do the first half of the session with me, the flexibility and strengthening bit, then head off to play in the playground while I struggle with the set-pieces, I have even resorted to writing an 'L' for left on my hand so I don't end up inevitably facing in the wrong direction. I have been attempting to do my homework too, practicing one set of movements each week in the hopes that I might remember which bit goes where and what follows what...no such luck, I still cant tell a fisherman thingy from a barrel thingy from a whatever. I did like the bit in the instructions that suggested that you should never worry about learning wrong. The theory seemed to be that as long as the attempt was made, it was better to learn something. That's my kind of learning.
I just keep hoping that continued effort will pay off and I can improve to the point where I am just consistently mediocre rather than persistently awful. Unlike the lists of strength exercises dutifully administered by the well-meaning coach of some years ago, I can actually feel this doing me good though. More importantly, I admit to a sneaking enjoyment, Tai Chi for me is a win. Who knows, one day it might even rub off on my slightly resistant daughters, currently they would appear to 'suffer' for the sake of their mum.
So the part of my brain that always feels guilt about the apparent selfishness of my endurance training asks the question "why drag them off to Tai Chi on Saturday morning...wouldn't it be nice to have a leisurely start to the day?". Um...yes. Yes but...
Yes BUT the weekly session of Tai Chi seems to have kept my leg problems, particularly that nasty ITB, at bay since I started doing it. Yes BUT this week's training time is already down since I had a Monday evening meeting and missed out on spin class due to an overbooking on Thursday. Yes BUT I'm doing no other flexibility or strength training. Yes BUT I really want to get better at this Tai Chi thing, not just mimic the moves, I want to understand it.
Yes BUT. Sadly enough, if you have a busy life there actually has to be a degree of selfishness in order to be an endurance athlete, otherwise it just wouldn't happen. So tomorrow morning we will have a relatively relaxed start but will be out the door by 9am. We will meet up with the disparate group of mainly women at the local school, drink some sort of tea out of tiny cups, usually a new variety provided by instructor Stacey, and talk about whatever until called to order. The girls will do the first half of the session with me, the flexibility and strengthening bit, then head off to play in the playground while I struggle with the set-pieces, I have even resorted to writing an 'L' for left on my hand so I don't end up inevitably facing in the wrong direction. I have been attempting to do my homework too, practicing one set of movements each week in the hopes that I might remember which bit goes where and what follows what...no such luck, I still cant tell a fisherman thingy from a barrel thingy from a whatever. I did like the bit in the instructions that suggested that you should never worry about learning wrong. The theory seemed to be that as long as the attempt was made, it was better to learn something. That's my kind of learning.
I just keep hoping that continued effort will pay off and I can improve to the point where I am just consistently mediocre rather than persistently awful. Unlike the lists of strength exercises dutifully administered by the well-meaning coach of some years ago, I can actually feel this doing me good though. More importantly, I admit to a sneaking enjoyment, Tai Chi for me is a win. Who knows, one day it might even rub off on my slightly resistant daughters, currently they would appear to 'suffer' for the sake of their mum.
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