Personal Goal #1 - meditation

Last year, during the year of the rooster, I participate in the alpha mind workshop. This 2 weekends program was teaching meditation techniques to visualize and achieve success in life. That workshop was part of my rooster personal goals.

My first goal for the year of the dog is to practice these techniques and to benefit from this type of meditation and visualization. 

I plan to do at least 52 of the “short” meditation and 12 long meditations. I wrote short in double quotes because the short meditation is not short. It takes about 10 minutes. The long session is about 30 minutes. It is hard to find the time to do these without being interrupted. 

I also plan to also take 4 more workshops of meditation this year. This will be to expand my knowledge and experience with different meditation techniques. 

End and Start

Yesterday we had our banquet which marked the end of the Rooster year. The day was busy as always and I think we got to work like an oiled machine. Before, during and after.

From my perspective, this was a great banquet. Maybe because of the switch between the performance and the meal (finally got to eat...) and maybe because I'm getting used to it.

I do want to thank everyone who took part in organizing the day. We all did great as a team!

Looking ahead to the Dog year. I tried to stay focused on the Rooster so I am a little late with some of the Dog stuff. I need to keep it going with the changes required with new forms, new goals.

I am excited to see new members on the team and I will be missing some that are not returning. I wish everyone Happy New Year and a successful Dog year!

Planning the chaos

I'm a planner. There is not doubt about this. In the past, I used to plan so much that I never got to execute my plans.

In the last few years I've learnt to adapt, to accept that some things might not go as planned, and to adjust.

I think that now I get to plan multiple plans in my head. If plan A is not working, try plan B or C. But I am also getting better of doing ad-hoc planning where it is all based on the changing scenarios.

I've been challenging myself in some occasions to not plan at all and to be able to adjust what I'm doing as I go. I find it challenging but I do learn a lot about myself.

This year - the dragon dance is semi-choreographed. I know what sequence of moves I am going to do but I do not know which side it is going to be. It will depend on where the lion is... So dragon guys, if I start doing the barrel roll during the demo - you better be ready!

Keep going forward

Looking at the past IHC year, I do not want to summarize it as a failure or as a success. I like looking at the IHC as a series of successes and a series of failures. As mastery is a journey not a destination, I cannot say "I failed" or "I succeeded" as I'm still in the the process of mastery. I will continue to fail, I will continue to achieve my goals. I will continue to better my self. I will never stop.

It is one thing to say you are going to do it and another to actually do it

When I am thinking of the Adopt the Driveway program, I think that as a team we failed this year. It is not that the driveways are not cleared. But there are some elements missing from how we are doing it that takes away many of the benefits that could have been realized from this program.

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There were too many times this year where someone cleared the driveway alone. No team building here.

I'm not aware of any SRKF member who is not IHC member (other than kids of...) that joined the shoveling effort. We did not inspire the kwoon to join.

There are only a handful of IHC members who actually went to shovel this year and many who did not even gone once. This imbalance in the team is not healthy.

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I would assume that it is not convenient for anyone to go and shovel. We are all busy and have our own agendas. But if as a team we signed up for this, understanding the benefit of helping elderly people with this, I would have expect that people would prioritize this and make more of an effort to help with shoveling.

As we are still in the midst of winter, I challenge everyone in the IHC to participate in this team effort. There is still a chance to make it a success.

Balance

Life is a balancing act. There are competing priorities for every single minute and every single energy we have. If we had one and only one priority, we would be doing it 24-7, getting REALLY good at it. But, we have multiple priorities and a limited time and limited energy resources and therefore we need to choose wisely what we do and when we do it.

Part of my decision this year was to progress at work into a different role. This new role requires me to put more effort into training and it also result in more time away from home. This time is not there for picking. There are consequences to this. It means I have less time for things I used to do.

What is important for me is that my values, what I consider the "non negotiable" activities, are not negatively affected.  As I said, this is a balancing act.

Fitness class

After a break of about 7 months, we had fitness class again. There was a very good turnaround for the first class of this seminar and as always- Sifu Masterson’s class was great.

It was hard and fun at the same time.