Side Heel Month of June - Recap

I have completed my “Side Heel Month of June”.  I’m proud to say that I didn’t miss any days and I have another 3000 kicks under my belt.  

My main focus for this challenge was to identify major issues that are holding me back from improvement. The following are what I noticed,

1.  I need to keep my body more upright. I’m leaning far more than I need to and causing a disconnect. 

2.  I need to define my crane more, both initially and at the end.  Almost like I need to consolidate everything before kicking and then reconsolidate again before stepping back (controlled).

3.  I need to incorporate my arms.  It’s almost like they have nothing to do with this kick and are just an afterthought.  They tend to just flail and end up adding to the problem rather than helping.

4.  I need to really work on opening up on my left.  I think this is the major difference I’m feeling between sides.   When I kick with my right, things feel much better than my left, which tends to feel constricted and “tight”.   This is with all kicks and exercises. 

5.  I need to maintain that connection between my energy and intent.  Even when all the other things above are working, if I’m missing this, everything is just weak and feels sort of pointless...for lack of a better way to describe it. 

As I wrote the above, I was reminded of the 6 harmonies.  The connection between our upper and lower halves.  Our left to our right.  Hands-feet, elbows-knees, shoulders-hips, spirit-intent, intent-chi, chi-strength.  I’ve always considered my issue with the Side Heel as a problem with balance. Yes, I become off balance, but I think that’s a symptom, rather than the cause.  Now that I see these things in writing, I am noticing the correlation to the 6 harmonies and I think my main issue is having several disconnections at the same time.

I did take a video at the end and compared it to one from March.  You’d think after that many kicks there’d be something that improved, even if it was small.  Unfortunately I can’t say anything has improved.  In fact, the March one looks better.  

I’ll keep moving forward. Although right now I’m not sure what to focus on first.  There are so many things that need work.  And they all seem to be connected.  I'll likely focus first on the precision in my crane.  It's both the start and the finish to this kick, and others, so seems like a logical place to start.