Perspective

Stress has a way of skewing perspective to the point where things that should be alleviating stress are actually compounding it. It isn’t difficult to regain a clear outlook but one has to recognize a distorted perspective first before the issue can be addressed.

I often have to remind my students that kung fu is there to serve them, not the other way around. When we’re not training and improving as we should, guilt tends to set in. With guilt comes a multitude of negative emotions that induce a negative mindset that shifts perspective so that where kung fu used to be an opportunity and tool for mastery, it becomes a responsibility with its own associated stress.

I begin and end everyday by reminding myself that I am who I am because of kung fu. Most of the defining moments of my life can be traced to that seminal first kung fu lesson almost thirty years ago. Any guilt I feel about the state of my training, or of my life in general, is only a reflection of my own ego. Kung fu will always serve me and any limits to its capacity to help me are set by my own efforts.

“Guilt is anger directed at ourselves.” - Peter McWilliams (1949 - 2000)