Yah, that's me. The tiny little dot up at the very top there. I felt like I was on top of the world looking down at everything around me. That is how I am feeling right now. Like I am on top of the world. I have jumped back into my training after a great holiday. I am doing a lot of push ups and situps to get caught up, and it doesn't seem quite as hard as I thought it was going to be. The more I do, the more I want to do. I find myself not just wanting to get caught up, but get ahead. As a martial artist, as a person, as a member of society in general, I often feel I am different from a lot of the people I associate with through work and church. Two days of my holiday was spent in Vegas. Well, we stayed at a hotel in Vegas, 2 blocks from the strip. We didn't really do anything in Vegas, except for spend a few hours in 2 of our favorite kinds of stores . . . an outdoor store, and a book store. The rest of the time we spent out at a place called Red Rock Canyon. We rock climbed around there for a day and a half. It was so much fun! We did a lot of this kind of climbing on my holiday and it was such a blast. But most people I talk to just chuckle and say, "you are the only people that go to Vegas and don't check out the sites, or shows, or party or gamble, or check out the strip". I am a very simple person, and I like simple things in life. I don't care about fancy shops, and I don't drink or gamble. I don't enjoy being in places with large crowds, and especially places with a lot of party type socializing going on. It just isn't my scene. It was a bit of a culture shock for me just to wander through the casino to get to our hotel room. It was kind of scarey to be honest. Have I lived a sheltered life? No, just a simple one. Kung fu grounds me in my simple life. It gives me the tools to be the person I want to be. It gives me the base that I build myself on and the principles to use while building who I really am and want to be. During our holiday we spent a few hours in the Barnes and Noble bookstores. One in LA and one in Vegas. One of the books that caught my attention was called 'To the Last Breadth'. It was written by a man who went about to test himself in the world so to speak and do things that were adventurous and tested his limits. (Something like that). During this journey of his he learns so much about himself and about life. During his journey, he befriends a monk and learns that Buddhism is a code of conduct. A path towards thinking and right action. That's the basis I am talking about. Kung fu is a code of conduct. It is leading me towards a particular way of thinking and acting. Another interesting thing the book says, is "to work for the benefit of others". "Simplicity, generosity, compassion, are at the core of right conduct". That says it all. Right along with this idea is the thought that "suffering comes from a preoccupation of oneself", and "the root cause of disappointment is desire". All of this stuff is part of our martial arts training. It's in our theory and it's in the words of Sifu Brinker all the time. Anyways, I am babbling and got myself derailed. I feel so strongly that kung fu makes all of us a better people. It can help us, steer us, lead us, train us, simplify us, uplift us, and strengthen us. I could go on and on. I recognize all of these benefits in my life every day, and all day long. For that I am grateful.