Tao of Life: Synchronicity

So I'm in the middle of starting another post when I find myself in the bathroom, kind of absent-mindedly thumbing through Journey Into Power, a yoga book by Baron Baptiste. I landed on crow pose (aka crane pose) bakasana. Here's the spiritual advice Baptiste offers for this pose "Letting go means giving up attachment to results. When you understand that you don't have to try hard, you can give up the fight for results, because you know that ultimately things will work out as they should. Desiring a certain goal in a pose and working to achieve it is different from trying to control the outcome. Just be willing to relax and let go. Know that if one door closes, five new doors will open up. That is true faith: trusting the natural ebb and flow of life."

Sounds like exactly the advice I need to help me not only achieve push-ups but to do my best in class. Sometimes I really do get caught up in wanting to do well and look good when I should be letting go!

The Perfect Push-up

I have been training for so long now and I am quite embarassed that I can only really do 3 perfect push-ups before my arms give out. Last week I bought some hand weights to help strengthen my arms while I am doing other activities such as forms, punching, blocking, and even sit ups and yoga. Still I am impatient with my progress.

So I ran a search on the internet "I can't do push-ups." The first article I stumbled across was Why Girl Hockey Players Can't Do Push-ups. The article sites poor posture and incorrect form while attempting push-ups.

To do the perfect push-up:

Your body must be in a perfectly straight line through the entire movement. In order to maintain this position, players must be able to keep their core tight (think about tightening up as though someone was going to punch them in the stomach), squeeze their butts (that one usually gets a few giggles) and squeeze their shoulder blades down and together (like they are trying to squeeze them down into their back pockets). When girls are able to maintain this position as they lower themselves down towards the ground, they take the load off of their "weaker" arm muscles and rely more on their "stronger" chest and core muscles to perform the movement.

I didn't know all that! I'm going to have to try that and get back to you. My core feels like it is getting stronger every day, but I didn't know I could use it to help my push-ups.

I guess ultimately I just have to face up to my push-ups. I try to do them every day but it doesn't feel much like I'm accomplishing anything by just doing three. Another website I found said "Just do 3 in the morning and 3 at night and add on one more the next day." That's what my instructor said to do...but I haven't forced myself to really stick to that routine.

I have a feeling I'm going to be asked to do at least 10 push-ups at my next belt test. At the last one he said to do 5 and I think the adrenaline of the testing atmosphere kicked my body up a noch because I actually did them!