trainings partner

I had an incredible opportunity this year to train with a partner and work on a double fan form. I thought I'd share why this was such a great experience and why I'm a little sad and scared to go into the next year.

The most obvious advantage of course was having the accountability partner! I know as a team we are all serving that purpose to a point but there is no substitute for somebody that literaly relies on your performance. That means for me not only that I have to show up and that I practice my form, but it also meant trying to deal with what I consinder severe anxiety or stage fright. This became evident at one of our spontanious demos at our potato bake in August. We were set to show of our form, we had managed to demonstrate a few times already, maybe not perfect but not bad at all. This time however the demo was happening outdoors and the wind was a real issue. We recognized that we won't be able to do our normal routine and decided in the last fife minutes to change our form in several parts. Now this caused my anxiety to spike. We started our performance, got to a point where we changed the sequence, and my brain went BLANC. There was nothing there, no memory of what we had decided to do and also no creativity to solve the problem. Just pure emptyness! I remember feeling absolutely awful and embarrassed, because after all it was not just me I felt responsible for.

We were facing each other when I said in panic "I can't!", she looked at me not sure what was going on in her mind but just responded "well, you'll have to!"😁 And so I did! I'm not at all sure how we went on and I was anything but proud, but before I knew it our form was finished somehow. I don't remember a thing about it, but this moment got stuck in my brain. I know for certain that if I had done this form alone, I'd have stopped and very embarrassed left the "stage".

Having a partner that relies on me functioning when it matters was causing me more stress to a point but at the same time I feel her support and her trust that I can do it and that actually now lowers my anxiety.

Having had a partner when coming up with a form was a lot of fun and seemed actually really easy. Changing our form several times even until lately, to make it fit on the stage seemed wayyyyy more difficult however. Every change on my side has an effect on her side and the other way around. But again this was fun the whole way it kept the process interesting and challenging.

I believe this experience has helped us bond as team members and created a friendship and with that, I think it helped me to deepen my relationship with our club, our team and Kung Fu in general!