Songs and Spinnings

Yep, I'm on a roll here. Grin... there might be people who haven't read it yet. Maybe... And it's a nice reminder of exactly why I was whimpering for a trainer in the last actual *current* entry too...

BLISTERED KNUCKLES, HAPPY HEART

Let get one thing straight right at the outset. I'm a *nice* person. No honestly, I mean it. Stop sniggering - it's not polite. I'm serious.

I'm a pacifist generally. I don't like conflict. I try to avoid trampling roughshod over other people's feelings. I recycle my garbage. I have an e-mail address with wildmail, and I do their 'click on this site and our sponsor will give x amount to y eco-charity' thing on a relatively regular basis. I try to be courteous, considerate and thoughtful unless there's a damn good reason not to be. Basically, as I said before, I'm *nice*.

So what is it about having a personal trainer wander over to my flat every week and get kitted up in body armour, sticking the stereo on full volume, strapping my knuckles and proceeding to punch, kick, elbow and knee the crap out of the poor guy (who's never done anything to deserve it except, possibly, for taking my money in a purely voluntary-on-my-part transaction) for an hour - and choreographing each and every blow to driving, pounding music - that feels SO. DAMN. GOOD?

It occurs to me as I write this that there are guys out there who'd probably let me beat them up - without the body armour - for free. Hell... if I moved in the right circles, there are probably some of them that would pay me for the priviledge. But I somehow don't think they'd let me do it to techno versions of Mission Impossible, We Will Rock You, Sledgehammer and Addicted to Love. Nor would they be coaching me on my technique and egging me on as my ability to focus starts to wane towards the end of a track. Nope, I'm afraid the money's going to have to keep travelling in the wrong direction - i.e. away from me - if I'm going to be allowed to keep this up...

If I had a psychology background, I'd probably say something like 'it's exactly *because* I'm a nice person that I find this kind of workout so satisfying - after all, nice people don't always get to express their angers and frustrations at the times they occur - so they, more than anyone else, *need* the safety valve that Body Combat (the brandname of the particular system my trainer uses) offers'.

Oh wait. I do have a psychology background.

And I can't, from personal experience, disagree with this fairly simplistic view of what's going on for me psychologically during a training session.

But I do think there's more to it. There's an adrenaline rush, sure, but it's totally safe (OK - it might be more realistic if my trainer was actually hitting back - setting up some kind of sparring routine with me - which would be cool, but that's not something he offers, so it might have to wait until I get back to a 'real' martial art). Actually, I'm not sure that I can say this is *totally* safe even as it is.

I have to watch my technique very carefully... every now and then I'll land a punch wrong, with my wrist slightly bent or with something just the slightest bit out of alignment, and the impact will jar straight up my forearm, leaving my wrist sore for a few days. And even if I don't land things wrong - at the intensities that I'm punching, scraped knuckles (I even managed to acquire a couple of blisters underneath the wraps today) are pretty much de rigeur after an all-out session.

And that's not to mention that, even in body padding, there are always bits of the trainer left exposed... it's all very well him urging me to do my back-kicks fast and at full power, but he's not going to be legally responsible if I castrate him by mistake because I mis-aimed the final kick in a set! Maybe I should make him sign a 'hold harmless' agreement for me, just so we're on equal ground legally?

But it *is* safer than any form of real sparring would be - I've known one guy who shattered all the bones in his wrist through blocking a kick the wrong way during a sparring match that was supposed to be non-contact. The kicker had assumed the blocker was going to step away out of range of the kick. The blocker had other ideas - ideas which resulted in his arm being in a cast for something like three months or so. That's *not* something I'm likely to come up against in this training, and I'm just as glad that's the case.

I do, however, get to practice my technique, without having to respond to an opponent who's trying to hurt me while I'm doing it. And I get the glorious feel of actually hitting something. Full power. There's nothing you can experience in a class practice that prepares you for the first time you hit something full power and Your. Knuckles. HURT! But I get that every training session. So in some ways, although I'm deprived of the interaction with a bona fide opponent, I'm also making the most of learning what I can in the absence of one, so that I can spar better when I go back to martial arts once I get home.

And none of these explanations go anywhere near the fierce joy I take in being able to push myself beyond the place I last had to quit - in 'extending my comfort zone', to quote the self-help gurus... the exquisite knowledge that I can't possibly find anything else inside msyelf - that this is it and I just can't go any further... and then somehow, I find it inside and go further anyway. There are many things I get out of these training sessions, but if I had to pick one, point to it and say 'this, above all else is what I'm grateful for', then that chance to go beyond my previous set of limitations - and the ability of my trainer to know exactly what to say this time to spur me into giving it that extra bit of effort right then and there to get me pushing through the barrier I just hit... that would be what I'd point to.

Then there's the purely biological, physiological joy of an intense workout - all those little endorphins (or endolphins, as a friend of mine likes to call them) rampaging through my system, making me feel higher-than-high (in a completely exhausted, but happy with it, kind of way. And look, Ma - no hangover afterward either!). Intense exercise like this has definitely become my way of choice to clear the cobwebs from my brain.

So maybe the money's not going in the wrong direction after all. I look at all the things I'm getting out of my Friday morning sessions, and I come to the conclusion that they're well worth the money I'm paying for them. All this, and it lets me stay 'nice' in the eyes of the outside world without going mad or turning into a doormat, as well! I'm thinking I've got myself a bargain here ;-)

Tags: accomplishment, aggression, boxing, gymwork, training