You know you’ve had a great workout the day before when you wake up in the morning and realize:
Golly! My left pinky finger is on sausage duty!
It’s actually not that bad – there’s only a 1/3" lateral swelling across the entire first joint. It looks kinda sorta like my finger has a cute little string balloon perched on to of it that’s begging to be twisted into a balloon dog.
Ah well, these things happen. The BJJ/etc in which I indulged yesterday was the culprit; I happily pushed myself until my muscles were trembling more than a card house built by 3 blind mice would (prior to crashing down, that is). Utterly great workout; it taught me many things about not only martial arts, but also the key following fact:
Even I, the All Powerful Mother Ling, has her limits.
I’ll be the first to admit, I have a huge ego. Huge! I pride myself on being able to handle activities/physical stress that would collapse the majority of my peers (so long as I know that my beloved hot bath and husband rub is waiting for me at home! 
). Take my last class in sparring, in which I was pulverised by the man with the legs the size of Montana – afterwards, our karate master asked me if I was okay …
(In hindsight, it probably was like gazing at someone covered in molasses and inquiring if they needed a bath)
to which I responded, of course! No problem at all! I’m fine! Bring it on! Whoopieee!
Picture a parakeet happily chirping that while facing off against a bunch of eagles, and you get the general gist.
Character-building…indeed.
Anywhos! So…my finger is smooshed a wee bit. And I have magnificently beautiful bruises on my arms and wrists (did some great wrist escapes!) that would cause Gauguin to swoon with joy!
And most importantly, I realized that I do have my own physical limitations and can honor the people who showed me that…
(never before in my life have I truly acknowledged this to my inner self….sure, just about everyone at the dojo can beat me in sparring (parakeet with the eagles again), but that’s merely reality. What I’m talking about is allowing how you perceive your inner YOU to accept it as well)
and I’ve now gained the maturity that allows me to offer praise and respect to those who gave me the opportunity to experience it in living color.
I’m so used to offering teaching moments to my kids/friends/colleagues that it’s nice to undergo it myself!
LIfe….it’s character-building.
So! With that, today is Sunday, and I hope you all have a wondrously entertaining time! Me, I’m going to practice what I learned yesterday, take the kids to the movies, and just generally go about reveling in this thing call ‘life’.
Enjoy!
Barbara Ling
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