My second time wearing armor.
It seems like my feelings about my kendo tend to go up and down with each practice session. Today was definitely a down.
I don't like hurting people; that's one of the reasons aikido appealed to me so much initially -- it promised the art without the violence. It seems odd that I would also be interested in kendo, which consists of hitting other people with bamboo swords... right?
Well, not quite. Kendo is one of the safest sports in the world; most injuries are self-inflicted from tripping or are some kind of bone/joint injury resulting from... tripping or swinging too much.
I should also say that I like kids. You know, in the grand scheme of things, there are a lot of things out there that are worse than kids. And in the grand scheme of things, there are a lot of people out there worse than kids. At least kids have the general excuse of youth and inexperience... which is also a point in their favor; they tend to be more honest about their feelings.
Well, today I felt kind of bad about my kendo because I was hitting kids... incorrectly.
In one case, the do strike, I kept missing his do entirely and hitting his ribs above the side of his do. I felt really, really bad about it, but I couldn't seem to get used to his height. Until now, I've only been practicing with sensei, who is slightly shorter than me, or other adults. Since I'm in armor, I'm supposed to practice with the kids, but it's definitely hard going -- they're all much, much shorter than I am!
I try to hold back the power on my men strikes, and I do, pretty successfully. The same on kote strikes. It's the do strikes that give me problems -- even before I put on bogu, I had pretty bad control over my do strikes.
So yeah, I walked out of today feeling like crap because I hurt a kid.
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