Be Present! CrossFit Tips
Be Present ! Crossfit provides it’s own unique sort of meditation. Not as much “Ohming” and more with the “Do I have what it takes to shut my screaming mind off and finish this?” The peaceful moment is reached at the nexus of what you thought you could do and discovering you are capable. To experience absolute mindfulness, to only have to worry about that exact moment, where your car note and the fight with your significant other no longer matter, one must transcend the possibility of what they could imagine or do by themselves. Enter our box and the little bleeping square clock. You are present.
Your ignition switch fires when people are yelling your name and you dig deep to get those 5 more reps. Yes, there’s pressure and attention but there’s also something else happening. Knowing that others believe in you pulls you out of yourself, where all your fears and false beliefs reside. Suddenly, for those 15 minutes the only things that matter are doing your best and testing your mettle. Because what’s happening is change. And it’s in this garden where real growth transpires, where the world slows down, all you can hear is your breathing and you become hyper aware and everything that your body is doing. When your mind is empty. You are fully present.
“Kime (pronounced “key-may”), or focus, is one of the critical elements in karate, and is conceptually intertwined with almost every other aspect. It is a mental state in which your thinking is concentrated entirely on your opponent and his intersection with your technique. Achieving kime involves certain Zen techniques designed for that purpose, most notably zanshin and mushin. It is expressed in the kiai and also in the facial expression and (especially) the eyes of the performer. The kiai helps concentrate the maximum force at the moment of impact, whereas the face and eyes reflect the correct mental state for producing maximum quickness and minimum reaction time.”
“Mushin (無心; Japanese mushin; English translation “no mind”) is a mental state into which very highly trained martial artists are said to enter during combat.[citation needed] They also practice this mental state during everyday activities. The term is shortened from mushin no shin (無心の心), a Zen expression meaning the mind without mind and is also referred to as the state of “no-mindness”. That is, a mind not fixed or occupied by thought or emotion and thus open to everything. For the origin of the mushin concept, see Muga-mushin. It is somewhat analogous to flow experienced by artists deeply in a creative process. They are present.
Mushin is achieved when a person’s mind is free from thoughts of anger, fear, or ego during combat or everyday life. There is an absence of discursive thought and judgment, so the person is totally free to act and react towards an opponent without hesitation and without disturbance from such thoughts. At this point, a person relies not on what they think should be the next move, but what is their trained natural reaction or what is felt intuitively. It is not a state of relaxed, near-sleepfulness, however. The mind could be said to be working at a very high speed, but with no intention, plan or direction.” Be Present! CrossFit Tips]]>
