Join Emerald Necklace Martial Arts for A Night of Healthy Living and Healthy Eating

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

BOSTON (Allston), Mass., November 14, 2011

On Tuesday, November 22, Emerald Necklace Martial Arts will be sponsoring "A Night of Healthy Living and Healthy Eating" to celebrate the benefits of maintaining a regular fitness regimen while also raising awareness of the benefits of a plant based-diet.

The event will feature a yoga class at 6:30 PM, followed by a vegan potluck meal. At 8:00 PM, the dojo will be screening the movie, "Forks Over Knives,"  a documentary film that highlights the links between the foods we eat and the degenerative diseases that threaten us the most. The evening will conclude with an open discussion about the impact of our food choices and tips for establishing and maintaining healthy eating habits.

"November is a very timely month to be talking about food," says Linda Gregorio, a vegan and a black belt member of dojo who is helping to organize the event. "We're finishing off our Halloween candy. Thanksgiving is approaching. And next will come all those holiday parties at which many of us tend to mindlessly overeat. This is the perfect time to focus on how our eating habits and food choices can play a role in 'self-defense.'"

The event is free and open to the public. Attendees are encouraged to bring a canned food donation to be delivered to the Greater Boston Food Bank, and healthy vegetarian or vegan dish to share. Any cash donations the dojo receives will go toward offsetting the cost of the screening and any remaining funds will be donated. Please RSVP by contacting the dojo by phone (617-202-3856) or by email.

"This is an important event," says Sensei Jason Gould, Dojo Director and Chief Instructor. "We're trying to spread the word about how what we eat may contribute to diseases such as type II diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease -- real killers that we need to protect ourselves from. And at the same time, we can use the event as an opportunity to help those in immediate need by collecting food donations for the hungry. I'm proud of my students for being so creative and ambitious with the projects we engage in to serve the community."

Gould has been conducting traditional karate classes and self-defense programs for adults since October of 2003. The students at Emerald Necklace Martial Arts regularly participate in community service activities as part of their Black Belt training. For more information about Emerald Necklace Martial Arts, please visit their website call 617-202-3856.

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Got some motivation this week!

A good friend of mine just sent me a You Tube link to some outtakes and trailers for a new Japanese karate action film called, "Black Belt." Now, I know the stuff in the film is precisely choreographed, but I can't watch it and not marvel at how GOOD these guys really are. The techniques and control the artists demonstrate is AMAZING! Makes me want to go out and train right now. Exactly the motivation I needed today!

See the You Tube film here.

Got some other motivation this week: my yoga instructor told me that she thought I was making progress in improving my flexibility. Now THAT was nice to hear — such a small compliment, and yet it made a HUGE difference in my outlook. I'm really enjoying the yoga class because it provides me with a weekly opportunity to do some "inner" and "outer" work. While holding some of the balance poses, I have no choice but to stay focused on where I am and what I'm doing RIGHT NOW.

It's a nice lesson for the "balance" I'm trying to achieve in the rest of my life.

Facing My Personal Nemesis

I hate yoga.

There! I said it. The truth is out!

Now, let me explain what I mean by "the truth:"

Yoga is my bugbear, my demon.. call it what you want — it's really hard for me! Even though I've trained in the martial arts for years and years, I'm physically very tight. My muscular flexibility and joint range of motion are two areas that I've constantly struggled with. And so I've avoided working on it — for years and years!

Downward dog? My mortal enemy!

Now, the truth is that I know how GOOD yoga is for me, mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually... I admire the art, it's practitioners, and all that yoga has to teach me. I subscribe to Yoga Journal. I even host yoga classes at my dojo. But the fact is I find it very challenging to face (and work with, and accept) my own physical limitations when I'm on the mat reaching for my toes and/or twisting my spine.

I've made significant improvements in recent years, but I've got a long way to go to get to where I'd like to be. And somewhere deep, down inside, I know that my physical inflexibility is probably a manifestation of a mental state. This is something I need to work on, a barrier I need to break through!

What better opportunity for growth could I ask for? I've added weekly yoga training to my UBBT.

What A Week This Has Been!

I took an hour out of the office to attend a meditation seminar by Shivabalananda, a meditation master from India. I went in very skeptical, mostly due to my unfamiliarity with the Indian culture, I suppose. The session had a strong spiritual theme, too, which I was a little uncomfortable with, but open minded about. You see, my personal meditation practice has always been very informal and VERY private, so sitting still and silent with my eyes closed in a room full of strangers (most of whom were dressed in traditional Indian garb) was more than just a few paces outside of my comfort zone. (Did I mention the vibhuti (sacred ash) that Shivabalananda's assistant placed on everyone's forehead?) When I meditate, I usually sit for no more than 10 or 15 minutes at a time, so a full 45-minute silent meditation was definitely a stretch for me, both physically and mentally. With the longer session, I went through a fairly intense period of "rejection" that must have lasted for about 25 minutes. But after that, my body FINALLY found a comfortable position, and my mind stopped wandering and resisting the silence quite so much. Once I settled down, I felt very peaceful — and free to explore my mind with curiosity. (I'd call it a "mental safari.") I definitely learned "something," but I'm having a hard time articulating exactly WHAT. There's more to explore here, for sure.

I taught a self-defense class for a group of blind young adults at the Carroll Center for the Blind on Wednesday evening. Amazing! This was absolutely one of the most personally rewarding things I've ever done — a personal victory! The students (ages 14-20) were the most energetic, positive, enthusiastic, appreciative, and polite group of young folks I've ever been around. And with a little training, MAN can they hit! It was a challenge to adapt my teaching methods for the audience, but everything fell into place in short order. I know the students left the training with a little more confidence. I left the training on CLOUD NINE. I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity, and I hope to do more training at the center in the future. WOW!

My physical training has been going well, although I think I somehow sprained my wrist. I've had to cut out doing push-ups this week to give my injury time to heal. I'm sure there will be other bumps and bruises that I'll have to deal with — this is a pretty minor annoyance that's hardly worth mentioning, except that I've started to see and feel results from my efforts, and I don't want to backslide! I've signed up for noontime yoga classes at work, too. They start next month.