[Journal Entry] 2017 Kuo Shu Tournament

My legs weren't at 100%. They hadn't been all morning. I had been taking it easy almost all week leading up to that Saturday. I got 7 hours of sleep the night before. I even took a short 20 minute nap during the lunch break. But still, my legs weren't 100% and were aching. And to add, I didn't even know I was about to go on until about 5 minutes beforehand. I had to rush to change into my shoes and get my shirt and sash on. But as sore as my legs were, as rushed as I was, and as anxious as I was, I still knew that I was ready. I trained too much and worked too hard not to be. So I said a quick prayer to God and my Lola, turned my game face on, and gave it my all.

I hadn't watched the video of my performance until this morning because I wanted some time to let everything settle in my mind. Most of the time when I would watch a video of myself, whether it be one of my dance performances or now with Wushu, how I would look in the video wasn't up to par with the expectation that was in my mind. There is no one harder on myself than me, and when I don't look the way I want to I get very upset and angry. That's always been one of the ways I've never been complacent. I'm always looking for ways to improve myself because there will always be something to work on, so very rarely will I find a video of myself that I'm proud of. But after watching the video of my Tiger Form, I can finally say that I'm proud of myself. 

My form is much improved from last year's Nu Tang Dynasty performance, especially when it came to not losing energy at the end. My stances were low throughout, I opened up my shoulders more, the pace was good with the right pauses when needed, and as always my yells were as loud as I could make them. It wasn't perfect. I still need to tighten it up in some areas, clean up my angles, actually nail the 540, and put even more speed and power. I also plan on tweaking it and maybe/hopefully implementing some more advanced combos at some point (gainer?!). But I can say with confidence that I earned that gold medal with this performance.

The 2nd event I had to do was my Staff Form in the Wushu Long Weapon division. I've always said that the staff is my weakest weapon so far. I'm just not as comfortable with long weapons and with this form not being a southern style form I did have lower expectations with how I would do in this division. I ended up finishing in 4th place, but my score wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I have a lot of work to do when it comes to using the staff, especially if I'm going to be learning some sort of southern staff form in the future.

My 3rd and final event was my Nan Dao (Southern Broad Sword) Form in the Wushu Short Weapon division. This division was the one where I felt the most pressure in. I didn't know exactly what to expect since this was an advanced division (there was no separate division for Beginner or Intermediate levels so I automatically had to be put in an advanced division). I just wanted to do the best I could and show that I could hold my own.

I'm not as pleased with how I did in this form compared to my Tiger Form, but I guess that should be expected because I've been working on my Tiger Form for over a year but have only been doing this form for about 3 months. It's lacking speed in a lot of the combos and the pacing needs to be better. But when I saw my scores and finished in 2nd place (behind 1st by only 0.01 point) I was in disbelief. I was so overwhelmed with emotion. As the head judge awarded me my silver medal, he said to me "It's an absolute honor and privilege to give you this medal." 

It's hard to explain everything that I was feeling at that moment. It's hard to explain it even now. When I moved back down to South Jersey after spending 11 years living in Central and years as part of the dance community up there, my plan was to find and dance with the community in Philly, but that hasn't worked out. Then last year I found and joined this Wushu school and my life hasn't been the same since. My passion for martial arts that I had when I was a young kid was immediately rekindled, and what I thought was just going to be a way for me to get healthier and back in shape has turned into something so much more. In a year and a half's time I have been able to accomplish and do things I never would have thought I'd be doing. As I wrote in my journal entry from July 22, I've trained the hardest and have become the most focused I have ever been in my life. I pushed myself as much as I could, and to actually see all of that hard work pay off in this way was surreal.

I want to say thank you. To my friends and fellow students at Master Li's school, you are my second family. Thank you for always being an inspiration to me. To Master Li, thank you for teaching me everything I've learned and will continue to learn. I am proud to call you my Sifu. To my family, thank you for always believing in me and sending me your prayers. To my fiance Mary, thank you for being my rock and my support. You make all of this absolutely worth it. And to my Lola... thank you for giving me the strength I needed. I miss and love you.

Remember... hard work really does pay off. Nothing is stopping you from achieving your goals but yourself.