Back to the Beginning

Today marked the fourth day in a row of extreme cold.

It’s been manageable — we’ve been training indoors — but today was tough. The kind of cold that feels like it’s settled deep into the bones, where most of your energy is spent simply trying to stay warm enough to move.

Training like this is never easy, but everyone does what they can. I tend to simplify things on days like these, returning to the forms that still — and likely always will — require constant attention. There’s comfort in that familiarity.

In the afternoon I spent time with Louis revisiting the basic form. It was necessary, and fair.

It’s not a flashy form, and I don’t think I gave it the respect it deserved when I first learned it. I was probably too eager to move forward, too focused on what came next, rather than understanding what was already there. And as it often happens, the wheel has turned, bringing me quietly back to the start — back to lessons that were waiting patiently to be learned properly.

Second chances have a way of doing that.

They remind you that nothing is wasted — just postponed.

And that thought, today, made me smile.