I Will...

Over the course of the next year I will be setting, planning, reevaluating and accomplishing some goals I feel are paramount to becoming a successful husband, friend, martial artist and all around person. I am a martial artist and most often I spend my time teaching and planning, working on the school and trying to grow a successful business but i forget or simply run out of time when it comes to trying to improve myself. Because of this I let my health and sometimes my sanity falter. So this small list of goals is an acclimation that I will no longer allow for this to become my reality. I will no longer lay my health on the back burner while i try to focus on "more important" issues because my first and most important goal is to be healthy so i can spend many long years with my wife Dani. She has been one of many who has taken notice and have made considerable sacrifices to make me a healthier person. "Thank you Dani, You'll never know how much that means to me"

Health

1. Reduce sugar intake to only once per week.

2. Eat Salad daily

3. Reduce red meat consumption and eat more fish or chicken. (better for type A blood)

4. Spending 30 min to an hour a day just for me. (listening to music, playing video games, drawing, writing, or just staring out the window doing nothing)

5. Get to bed by midnight no later, no exceptions (on work days)

6. Work on strengthening my shoulder to reduce further injury.

7. Stretch everyday for me and not for class.

8. Complete 50,000 push-ups and sit-ups properly varying positions with full range of motion.

9. Floss my teeth daily

10. Take supplements (like protein and MSM)

Family

1. Do whatever I can do to help Dani in her career

2. Save for a home.

3. Spend time writing with Dani writing.

4. Call my mom and dads weekly

5. Make a trip back to Nashville so I can spend time with Dani's Parents and fly my parents down.

6. Set money aside for having a family in the future.

7. Get health insurance for Dani and I

8. Learn to play Guitar with Dani.

9. Go down to Minden every month to hang out with Dave & MaryAnn McNeill

10. Contribute to Goju-Shorei More.

Martial Training

1. Learn the 9 Thai combos and their defenses.

2. Earn my black belt in Goju-Shorei Weapons

3. Test for 4th Degree

4. Work towards blue belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu

5. Start learning Aikido

6. Review, document and film all the katas.

7. Practice massage and acupressure.

8. Learn Suparinpei Kata

9. Become more proficient in Bo and Nunchacku

10. Learn more tricks (720, Webster, butterfly twist, 540 Jackknife and more)

These goals which I have set for myself are only a beginning. Like many goals they will need to be reevaluated and adjusted as time goes by but failure is not an option. I will add professional goals in my next post.

Another Pebble Drops

I'm a big physics buff. "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction" Cause and Effect. Like dropping a pebble in a pond, you get ripples. Soon those ripples cross the entire pond. Its fascinating really, that one little tiny pebble can create such a changing effect on the surface.

In truth we are constantly throwing pebbles into the pond. everything we decide has an effect somewhere. Some are big and others small. The people we meet open doors for us to meet more people who may in turn change your life. Take me for example. 5 years ago I meet a man named Greg who became a great friend. He introduces me to another man, Grand Master Dave McNeill. Master Dave and I become very close and he invites me to do the thing called the UBBT "Ultimate Black Belt Test". From there I meet Dani Carroll who later becomes my wife. Now if Greg would have never walked into my school and took a lesson from me I would have never met Master Dave who has now been my most trusted friend and instructor and conceivably I would have never met my beautiful wife whom i love and cherish more then words can write.. You never know where your choices will inevitably lead you. My last UBBT adventure changed my life in ways I never thought possible. All I have today was bread from a single decision to change, to drop that pebble.

So here I am again with another pebble in my hand. Staring at the pond that is my life wondering what ripples will be created and how my life will change. I'm neither expecting or doubting what will be made from this decision I'm just accepting of it, whatever it may be.