Pig Post 7

How to change the world

I recently watched a video where a U.S. Navy Admiral was giving a keynote address to a graduating class.  In his address, he outlined the ten things he learned in Navy Seal training that you need to do if you want to change the world. I have posted a link below so I’m not going to talk about all ten points, but one stood out to me.

Step 1…Make your bed in the morning.

He explained how in training, they had to have their beds made perfectly every morning and that it took him many years to understand why. If you want to change the world or accomplish something, you need to be able to complete tasks.  By making your bed in the morning, you have already completed your first task, this gives you a sense of accomplishment thereby motivating you to accomplish more tasks.

Some days, motivation is hard to come by, but by starting out of the gates by making your bed or let’s say knocking off some sit ups and/or push ups, you have already achieved your first set of tasks for the day.  The important part of this is, recognizing that you have already achieved something and use that to motivate you or even change your perspective for the day.

So if you find yourself struggling with completing tasks, whether they are personal, work related or event I Ho Chuan requirements, maybe start by making your bed.

Thanks for reading.

Mike

https://youtu.be/TBuIGBCF9jc

Pig Post 6

Weapon forms

Ever since I first saw Bruce Lee swinging chucks around and fighting an entire rival school, I have been a fan of hinged weapons. I have previously created a single chuck and a double chuck creative form. When I decided to once again study the chucks for my I Ho Chuan weapon, I wanted to do something different, something creative, something I hadn’t seen before.

My plan was to pay homage to Bruce Lee by incorporating parts of his most iconic fight scenes into one single form. Now in theory, awesome idea. However in reality, that didn’t really translate well into a form.  Once I started to analyze these scenes from a scholastic and technical perspective, not very much there. A whole bunch of strikes, a few kicks, the odd palm heel strike with the occasional iconic Bruce Lee sound (I’m not even sure what to call that) makes for some great entertainment, but not a great technical form.

So, I needed to scrap that idea…sort of.  I have been told, when you make a form, visualize your opponents and your form will start to take shape. So although, I am creating my form with my own techniques, my inspiration is Bruce Lee’s opponents from that school where he was surrounded by no less than a dozen rival students (I’m only using 8).  So far so good, I am about 2/3 done my beta form and I am happy with it.

In my previous forms, I was focused on some of the flashy techniques that look cool, but this year I am focusing on the intent of my techniques, good stances and practical application.  Once I have this established within my form, maybe then I will incorporate some razzle dazzle.

Thanks for reading.

Mike

Pig Post 5

Two Ice Cubes Please

Over the multitude of decades, we have transitioned into an age of instant gratification. The old adages of “good things come to those who wait” or “fine wine isn’t made in a day” and countless others have seemed to have been forgotten.  This I think, is a side effect of our enhanced connectivity to each other by way of our advancing technologies.

Children today will never experience the buildup of anticipation for Saturday morning cartoons like in the sixties and seventies as this has been replaced by the instant access of cartoons twenty four hours a day via a multitude of cartoon networks on TV or the internet.  Gone are the days you wrote a letter to a friend or a distant family member and waited patiently for weeks (sometimes months) for a reply. No longer do we need to wait for the appropriate season to get our favourite fruit or vegetables nor do we have to trek to the store with our film and wait a week or so to have it processed into pictures. With Amazon Prime, I can have almost anything I desire at my door within a day or two. I can only reference the past forty years or so, but if you had this conversation with someone in their seventies or eighties, they could give even more examples. This exciting time of globalization has definitely enhanced our lives but we as a society have, to a degree, lost that ability to invest in the long term.

Recently, as part of one of my personal requirements, I have been learning to run.  I have never been a runner, nor do I overly enjoy it, however I do understand its benefits and do appreciate the achievements associated with it.  I am working towards a 10K run and my training hasn’t been going too bad, however I found myself rushing it. I am lacking patience.  Although I started training only a few weeks ago, I found that I wasn’t sticking to my program, I kept pushing it to go further and faster.  Now this isn’t necessarily a bad thing to a degree, but I have found this has actually slowed my progress down.  Too much, too soon creates injuries and takes away from the “enjoyment”.  Patience is a virtue, and although I can’t run 10K today or tomorrow, with slow and steady progress, I will, someday.

Like we have often heard, you can only climb a mountain one step at a time and I know I need to invest time and energy over the long term for long term goals.  I will run 10k, I will savour the wait and the anticipation, however in other areas, I will enjoy instant gratification, and I will continue to get two ice cubes in my coffee because I want to drink it now.

Thanks for reading.

Mike

Pig Post 4

Mending a Relationship

I have a relationship with someone that isn’t what it should be. When I first joined the I Ho Chuan several years ago and pondered this requirement, the relationship I needed to mend was obvious and is still the same relationship that I endeavour to build today. This is a relationship that is important to me and my family and I have invested a lot of time and effort in it.  Unfortunately, I am often left with the perception that this effort is not reciprocated.  

Several years ago, I would say that our relationship didn’t even exist.  Due to the lack of effort on the other side, I chose not to call or check in until that person did.  It got to the point where we only connected maybe once or twice a year at Christmas or a birthday.  I am not sure if this was pride, ego or just stubbornness, but my choice did not benefit anyone including myself or my family.

So, ever since that first year in the I Ho Chuan, I made the effort.  I called every week, I would set up plans to meet once a month and I would engage this person on a regular basis to ensure they were involved in my family’s life.

Recently, I reached out to this person asking them to attend something that was very important to my family.  They didn’t seem very interested, but I explained how important it was and they agreed to come, that is until a few days prior. This left me hurt, frustrated and honestly pissed off.  So, I chose not to call or to engage. We have not spoken in almost a month, that is, until today. 

Did this person call me? No.  I called them. With some other recent events, I was once again reminded life is short. Too short for pride or egos to get in the way of family. So I called and I will call again.  Part of this is I need to set an example for my children.

I have come to the conclusion, that this is not a relationship that necessarily needs mending, but it needs continual maintenance.  So I will continue to do my part.  I will call, and I will engage regardless of the reciprocity. Pride, ego and even judgement have no place here.

Thanks for reading.

Mike

Pig Post 3

Passion

There have been a few posts and conversations lately about passion.  Due to some very recent experiences and observations, I would like to weigh in on this subject.  As I am contemplating this subject, a myriad of thoughts are flooding my brain, so my apologies if this is a long read.  I’m hoping it’ll be worth it.  But without further ado, let’s sit down, buckle up and get to it.

Sifu Brinker mentioned that passion just doesn’t happen, but it needs to be developed and grow from the efforts you put into it.  I couldn’t agree more but let’s jump ahead a bit. 

Let’s say you have developed your passion. I will use myself as an example.  I have several passions in my life, older ones, newer ones, some that are still in that development stage.  One of my oldest passions is my profession.  By trade and first and foremost, I am a paramedic. This is a passion that has been developing, growing and evolving over the course of some 27 years (minus 8 days, not that I am counting).  My passion isn’t about being a paramedic per se, it is about helping people.  Now every paramedic who has ever been asked the question, “why did you become a medic?” will say, “I want to help people”.  Almost cliché, but an answer that I would expect and want to hear none-the-less.  It has been many years since I have worked as a frontline paramedic (and I miss that every day), but my passion for that work and for helping people is still present.  The intent of this post is not to be about me, but I feel I need to provide some context of my situation.  Through-out those 27 years, my passion has served me by providing opportunities for growth and promotion. I have moved up the ranks in my department, not because I wanted to climb the corporate ladder, but because I thought I had something to offer, my passion to help people. 

Skipping ahead a bit, I have been a manager for about 10 years.  I currently have a leadership team of about 10 supervisors that oversee about 200 staff.  That equates to a regular exposure to over 211 different and unique passions.  As you can imagine, this means many opportunities to see other people’s passion develop, change, stagnate, wax and wane and even fizzle out completely.  Now, sometimes it is easier to see things more objectively with other people than it is with yourself, but I can totally admit that everything that I have observed directly applies to me and my passion as well. 

One thing I have learned is, you need to take care of your passion.  Passion can be the fuel that gets us up in the morning, gets us through the day and even enables us to achieve monumental tasks.  However, if we continuously draw on our passion and don’t take the opportunities to rekindle and nourish it, our “fuel” can start to run low or run out.  When needed, if we don’t take the effort to harness and focus our passion to a controlled steady burn, it can overheat and explode depleting all of our fuel.  Sometimes we do need to open the valve on our passion to fuel a strong fire, however, even the largest of fuel sources will run out if not replenished or controlled.

Now the interesting thing about passions is they are very infectious.  If you surround yourself with people who are passionate and use their passion positively, your passion will grow and flourish.  However, the same can be said if you are exposed to negative and toxic passions.  Yup, those exist.  If you are a Star Wars fan, passions are just like the force, they can be used for good or for evil.

I have recently found that my passion was fatigued.  Not that I was burning too much fuel, but more because I wasn’t replenishing or nourishing it.  This coupled with an over exposure of negative or misguided passions as well as the multitude of stressors that comes with life in EMS, takes its toll.  This is where self-awareness and reflection are very important.  Although I did not recognize my passion fatigue, nor did I take steps to replenish it, sometimes if you are lucky (I definitely think I was), the universe may step in, slap you in the face, and do it for you.  If this happens, recognize and use it to refuel your passion.

My slap in the face came in the form of a seven year old girl. Well, actually it was a punch in the gut. She has an aggressive form of cancer and yesterday, she had a simple request.  She wanted to attend a gala with a paramedic as her date.  It didn’t take long for a barrage of people to step up and make this happen.  This was my slap from the universe.  Witnessing a group of people all with a passion to help others, coming together to make a seven year old’s wish come true. This reminded me why I do what I do and work with the people that I do. A young gentleman put his Saturday evening plans on hold and volunteered instantly to be her date. Another staff member came in from out of town (on a day off) to lend his dress uniform for the date.  Because of her condition, a medical crew also needed to be dedicated to this event. Not only did they offer their time, but decorated their ambulance to be just like Cinderella’s pumpkin coach. In a matter of hours we had a prince, a carriage and a myriad of flowers and gifts not only for this special lady, but her younger sister too. While the two young ladies had their hair done at the hospital, a team of paramedics, supervisors and managers all worked together behind the scenes to ensure everything from a safety and medical perspective was in place.  The evening was a great success and everyone enjoyed ice cream afterwards.  And although this came in as a “request” of our department, everyone involved was honoured that they were given the privilege to be a part of this very special evening.

I share my insights and this story as a reminder that we need to take care of our passions.  Don’t take them for granted. Don’t wait for the universe to slap you in the face, because more often than not, it doesn’t.  I was lucky.

Thanks for reading.

Mike

Pig Post 2

Organization and Mindfulness

As I said last week, the year of the pig really snuck up on.  I found myself not very prepared, neither physically nor mentally for my requirements.  From a numbers perspective, not a very good start to the year.

I often struggle with organizing and tracking what I have to do and when I have to do it with most things, let alone all of our requirements.  I really need to work on my mindfulness when it comes to this. 

As I write, this seems eerily familiar to a blog I wrote several years ago. 

One method I have used to help me accomplish daily tasks is developing routines, but as I have stated previously, I am back to shift work, which has a tendency to disrupt certain daily routines.  The problem with routines are they will always eventually be disrupted, because life happens. This is not insurmountable, but again, I just need to be aware and mindful to preplan for my days at work and to learn to be flexible on those days where the routine is blown out of the water.

I have developed an automated spreadsheet to help me track my numbers. It reminds of where I am and where I am supposed to be. Now this in itself can be good or bad depending on your perspective.  Like I said, I am behind on my numbers so every time I log in, it updates and reminds me with glaring red number of how well I am NOT doing (from a numbers perspective).  Well, at least my AOK are green.

Next step, I need find a mindfulness app to remind me several times a day to reset and refocus.  This will help significantly especially on work days (to quote a colleague, “walking through the front doors is like storming the beaches at Normandy”.  Although Normandy was before his time, he has definitely stormed a few beaches prior to coming to EMS, so I’ll take his word for it).  There are several apps out there help take me out of the combat zone for a few minutes each day, I just need to find the one that‘ll work for me.

So…

Am I where I want or need to be, two weeks in?  Nope.

Do I have a plan to get there?  Yup.

Do I have the tools to assist my plan?  Getting there.

Thanks for reading.

Mike

Pig Post 1

I can't believe it is the year of the pig already.

I would like to start this blog off by commending everyone involved in making last night's celebration a huge success. Congratulations to everyone who was promoted and to all the award recipients.  This was a very proud yet very humbling night to witness and be a part of.

As we transition into the this new year and I return to the I Ho Chuan team, I have been contemplating, planning, preparing and yes to a degree, stressing about the year to come. During my year away from the team, I left the Monday to Friday world and am once again doing shift work. This has been a stressor for me for as I start this year, I already know I will be unavailable for many of the meetings, the formal classes and team commitments as a lot of these do center around weekends.  Having said that, I will need to be mindful on how I can support team commitments as well as the team culture and dynamics. Engagement, inside and outside of the Kwoon will be instrumental in this.  A strong focus on my personal goals with an open testimony so others can learn and be motivated by my successes and my "unsuccessful attempts" (thought that would be better than using the failure word) is something that should be unhindered by my schedule.

As I am still pondering last nights festivities, I realize that I am starting this year on the team with a new perspective.  Although, I stepped back from the team last year, I was given the opportunity to see what a year in a candidate is like. I witnessed an amazing year of growth for Simon, Hannah and Andrew as well as many others.  A small understanding of what a year of hard work, commitment and dedication can help you achieve.

I am looking forward to a year of growth, new friendships and building on old friendships.

Thanks for reading.

Mike