Underneath my yellow skin

Category Archives: Physical Fitness

Gender, martial arts, and me (and society)

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Am I really going to write more about gender and martial arts? Why, yes, yes I am. Why? Because I can. And because I have more to say about it. Here is my post from yesterday in which I talked about finding a therapist. Mostly, I focused on how diufficult it is for me to find a therapist, even when I whittle down my epectations. However, as I was writing about it yesterday, I did another quick (five minutes) Google and found someone who fit very well. Except.

E is not a psychologist. I touched on why this is an issue for me yesterday, but I wanted to expand on it more in this post.

Look. I’m going to sound snobby, but so be it. I have run rings around my therapists in the past except for the last one. She was a Jungian psychologist whereas the others were social workers. And it’s easy to see the clear difference in the training. At least it is for me. I was a psych major in college, and I’m very adept at reading people. This is both a good thing and a bad thing.

It can’t hurt to at least talk to E, though. E has a free consultation and does both online and in-person sessions. I would do the former, which is not ideal, but the best I can do at the moment. And it’s better than nothing.

I have been expanding my weapon time because there is so much I want to learn. I got my new fan–the frame is metallic rather than plastic or bamboo. I have to say, I’m disappointed in it because it does not flick open easily. Maybe it’s because of the cold and it’ll be better once it warms up, but I would not count on it.

In addition, it does not close without a hitch, either. So my shitty seven dollar cheapo fan is actually better for the Fan Form than my more expensive metal one. I guess it makes sense given the intricacy of the fan, but I can’t help being a bit disappointed.

I have to pace myself. I was practicing the Swimming Dragon Form (Bagua), and I reached a point where I totally forgot what was next. I had been doing the first few movements on the left side, and I think that was messing with my brain. I watched my teacher doing the form, and it came back to me. Plus, I had to adjust a few movements, too.

I also tried using two fans to do the Double Saber form. That was interesting, but it did not work that well. The vibes were off, and I didn’t gel with the feel of it. It was fun to do, though.


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Even more about gender and martial arts

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I’m still on that gender/martial arts tip. And on that mental health tip. Here is my post from yesterday about how I am smarter than most therapists. I know how that sounds, but it’s true. No, smarts aren’t everything, but they are something. And for me, I cannot respect someone I can manipulate. One of the best things about my last therapist was that she would call me out on my shit. She was a psychologist, which I vibe much better with than the social worker mindset.

Here’s my issue with finding a therapist. I need someone who understands being a person of East Asian descent living in Midwest America. Then, toss in grief and family dysfunction, and we are narrowing the field rapidly. If I dare say queer, well, we might as well shut this shit down now. I know that I can’t have everything I want in a therapist, but it’s really hard to pare it down to the essentials.

I am a firm believer in therapy. I think it can be so helpful, and I got a lot from my last thearpist. But I had to go through half-a-dozen mediocre therapists before that. They ranged from bad to blah. One was really bad, but it wasn’t completely her fault. Another was nice, but inept. Another I can’t remember at all. My last therapist was the best, but she had her blind spots as well. She was focused on mother issues, which meant at times she was  biased for mothers in a way that was not helpful to me.

But the one thing I appreciated the most about her was the she called me on my shit. As I said, I had the tendency to talk circles around my therapists, but she would not let me do that. She would listen to me talk for several minutes. Then, she would cut me of and say something pithy. Early in our relationship, after one of my long ramblings, she said, “Minna, thinking is what got you into your troubles; it’s not going to get you out of it.” I protested, but she was right. Or rather, she was not wrong. I had the tendency to talk myself in circles without actually getting anywhere. I could get deep in the weeds without even touching on the actual isue. Much like my writing, come to think of it.

My point is, while I believe in therapy, I have a hard time doing it myself. The last time I tried, I looked at a popular website that is pushed by content creators. I was horrified by how it was run, though, and when I did more research into it, I realized that it was not good. Not just for potential clients, but also for the therapists who were working for it.


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More about gender, martial arts, and life in general

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My brother stopped by today to drop off my Premium Elite 2 Xbox Controller or whatever it’s called. I’m being flippant, but it’s by far the best controller I’ve ever had. I was wavering because it’s not cheap, but Ian swayed me because he has it and loves it. Once I got my hands on it, I realized that it was truly several cuts above the rest. Now that I have it back, I’m so happy. I tried it out, and it just felt so right in my hands. My one gripe is the reason my brother had it for a month–the left bumper stopped working all the time. It worked maybe a third of the time, which was even more infuriating than if it didn’t happen at all.

I looked it up, and it was a known problem for this expensive controller. Apparently, they cheaped out on the bumper buttons, which means that people have issues with them. This is, frankly, unacceptable for the amount of money we’re paying for them. Well, I say it’s unacceptable, but clearly it’s not. Would I buy it again? Sadly, yes. Because it’s just that much better than any other controller (expect for that one issue). I will say that it’s somewhat on me because I’ve dropped it several times. Still. I’ve dropped all my controllers several times, and this is the first time I’ve broken a bumper.

The other thing my brother wanted to do was to natter on about his newest obsession–espresso-making. He was not a drinker of coffee for all of his life. Then, his GF inherited an espresso machine, and now my brother is hooked. True to his nature, he bought an expensive machine and an app that monitors it from his phone. Plus other accessories that added up to a prettty penny.

I joked that of course he went hard on it once he got interested because that was how he do. I was also laughing beacuse that’s how I do as well. For me, it’s the weapons. I am so obsessed by them. Right now, I am learning the Cane Form with my saber after watching my teacher’s teacher do it. I have learned three of the four rows, and as I’ve said before, doing the Cane Form with the saber made both forms really click for me.

Here’s yesterday’s post about gender, martial arts, and more.

Listening to my teacher’s teacher talk about the cane and the saber made something go off in my brain. Before, I was struggling with both. Not the forms per se, but with how I felt about them. This is where the arts part comes in for me. The weapons need precision, yes, and it’s definitely martial, but the arts part is all about the feel for me. I’ve talked about how I relate to each weapon–and about how I’m vibing with them.

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Health, gender, and kung-fu fighting

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I have still more to say about gender and martial arts. That should not surprise anyone because once I get stuck on something, I go on and on and on about it. Yesterday, I talked about gender and what I think of it (not much). I’m so tired of talking about it, but it’s a big deal right now given the state of my country at the moment.

I have been voting for thirty years. I have voted Democratic almost every time*. I have not been happy about it most of the time because it’s just the least worst of two evils. The only times I’ve felt joyful about voting was for Barack Obama and Kamala Harris. Take from that what you will. I dutifully voted for whoever had the D by his (and yes, it was overwhelmingly male which says a lot about the Democratic Party, but taht is not what this post is about) name, but I never felt good about it. Or rather, rarely.

I know that I don’t belong to this time or place, but I also don’t think I would have fit in any time or place. And I don’t know how much fight I have in me to try to change the world for the better. I realize that I’m slipping back to where I used to be, more and more each day.

I know it’s because of inertia and because we tend to go back to homeostasis. In other words, we don’t move in a positive direction without being deliberate about it. Some people like my brother do it almost effortlessly. I envy that about him, by the way. If he thinks something sounds fun, he just does it.

When he was here a few days ago, he was telling me about his adventures in Taiwan and Thailand with his GF. Each day, they had a plan, but then they changed it on a whim if something else looked better. I remembered that from when we went to Taiwan together, and it was a nightmare for me.

I digress.

I tend to stick to my routines, and they work until they don’t. One big example is my sleep. I have always had shitty sleep, starting from when I was a kid. When I was six or seven, my mother would put me to bed at seven or eight, and I would put a t-shirt in the crack under the door so I could read until midnight. I have always liked the night better than the day.

When I went to college, I could not go to bed until 3:30 a.m, even though I had a class that was a quarter to eight in the morning. I would get up at 7:30 a.m. and race to class. I was so sleep-deprived that I could not find my portable alarm clock one morning. I looked for it for five minutes, and it was nowhere to be found.


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Two steps forward, two steps back

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I was going to write about something other than health/weapons today–

By the way. I find it highly amusing that I just wrote health and weapons back to back like they are equal things. Heh. Well, in my mind, they are, of course. Weapons equal health to me–or rather, the former leads to the latter.

A friend of mine asked how I was able to learn more than one form at a time. My very dissatisfying answer was that it’s a vibe thing.. Each wepaon feels different to me so that I do’nt mix up the forms. Not even after my medical crisis. My memory is shit in general, yes. I have to relearn movements from the forms I have most recently learned. Yes. But I don’t mix up forms, which I’m very grateful for.

I mentioned in previous posts that–oh, here’s yesterday’s post. Do with it what you will. I’ve mentioned in previouus posts that I have had trouble loving the saber and the cane, separately. With the saber, it’s because I expected to be the sword–and it wasn’t.Then, when I accepted it for what it was, I grew to be fond of it. Quite fond. But I never felt passionate about it until I started doing the Cane Form with the saber.

Coincidentally, I also didn’t care much for the cane when I first learned it. I think that’s partly because the pandemic interrupted my learning of it, which made it a very fractured experience. Buut, again, it was much different than the sword–which was the benchmark for weapons in general back in the day. I judged everything by the sword, and it was not a smart thing to do. Every weapon is different, and I needed to remind myself of that whenever I got frustrated with one of the weapons.

I love the sword. It is near and dear to my heart for many reasons. One, it opened me up to something that I never would have imagined would be so important to me. I can’t imagine my life without the weapons, and it all started with my teacher’s persistence in insisting that I just hold the sword.

I can still remember the scene as clear as day. I have recounted it several times because it was so important to me. It literally changed my life, and I would not be here without it. So I’m going to tell it again.

A few years after I started taking Taiji classes from my teacher, she mentioned weapons. She said it was time for me to learn the Sword Form. I protested. Vehemently. I was a pacifist at the time, and while I wanted to learn Taiji for self-defense, I could not imagine doing anything as violent* as weapons.

*I have also ranted at length about how women and AFAB people in this culture (and my heritage culture, Taiwanese, as well–even more so, actually) are brainwashed into thinking that the worst thing we could do is dare to be angry at someone. We were supposed to be selflessly (heh. I wrote selfishly at first. Freudian slip) giving to everyone with nary a murmur of protest.

In case you can’t tell, I’m still bitter and angry about this. I’m still unpacking the damage this has done to me, and this is one way I am healing that damage. I don’t talk about it much because most people misunderstand. Whenever I mentioned it on Twitter (back when I acutally used it and it wasn’t a trash heap of shit), I would get responses from men and women that were vastly different–but equally upsetting/annoying/irritating.


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More on health in general, and in specific

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I’m talking about health. Let’s talk morea bout it. In yesterday’s post, I talked at length about eating disorders–namely, my disordered thinking. I don’t know how to go about being healthy in a healthy way. Well, that’s not exactly true. Taiji and bagua are healthy for me, and when I do them, they short-circuit that part of my brain that is constantly telling me that I have to do better and juust be better.

I don’t know how to get out of that mindset, quite frankly. Any time I try to be sensibel abouut my diet, I go off the rails in one way or another. I need to find a thearpist, but it’s so daunting. Not just because it’s hard to find a therapist in general, but because what I’m looking for seems to be the unicorn of therapists.

I took the questionnaire on Better Help, and by the time I put in everything  I was looking for, they told me they had no match. That’s not surprising, but it was depressing. Here’s what I was looking for. Someone East Asian and queer. Someone who was comfortable with gender issuues, trauma, and grief. Oh, and family dysfunction.  And was in Minnesota (or aware of the Minnesota ethos). There was nobody.

Of course, this was just one (lshady, I later confirmed) website, so that means nothing. I went to the Psychology Today website and had a hard time finding anyone who fit my criteria, either. I had to toss out two or three of these criteria, which didn’t feel good. I decided I really wanted someone who was East Asian, non-male, and skilled in Minnesotan mentality, family dysfunction, and grief. Oh, and a psychologist. That last one was a killer.

I really don’t think that’s too much to ask for, but it’s like looking for a needle in the haystack. I gave up in discouragement, especially given how the election went and what is going on now in this country.

I need to get back to it, though. I can tell that my depression is deepening and my anxiety is getting worst. There is a hopelessness in my soul that is not going away. It’s sad because when I died (twice), I got a renewed lease on life–and then frittered it away. Now, I’m back to where I was before my medical crisis. Well, not quite as bad, but I’m fighting the same fight. It’s not surprising because I am the same person in general, but I wish I could have held ontto that better me for a longer time.

Back to health.

Eating is my bugaboo for several reasons. I don’t know if I will ever come to grips with it. I want to be at ease with eating, but I teeter from binging to starving. I can barely taste food as I eat it, and I don’t know when I’m hungry unless I haven’t eaten for, say, ten hours. I fucked up the mechanism that is supposed to tell me when I’m hungry while dealing with my two eating disorder eras, and I have never fixed it since.

In my sixth decade on this earth, I would like to finally be free of the disordered thinking that has plagued me since I was seven. It’s gotten better over the years, bit by agonizing bit, but it’s still not where I would like it to be.


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Let’s talk about health, bay-bee

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I’m going to talk more about taking care of myself. Here is the post from yesterday in which I explained why I did not care for the Instapot. I think one of the things that I have accepted about myself is that I am not going to do more than the bare minimum when it comes to feeding myself; I just am not. I am not going to cook more than pasta and premade sauce or rice and steamed veggies with rotisserie chicken from Cubs.

I wish I could find joy in cooking; I really do. It seems like something that would be great to get into, and you have a delicious result at the end. The problem is that–well, there are more than one issue with cooking for me.

One. I have so many food restrictions, and while substitutions are better now than they have ever been, it can be hard to find them in my local Cubs. And they’re more expensive than the regular items. I used to buy Lactaid cottage cheese, but for some reason, it’s not made any longer. I can’t find it at Cubs or online. I looked up recipes for something similar and easy to make. I tried it (out of tofu), and it was horrid. It did not taste like cottage cheese at all.

I knew better. Fake food items rarely taste like the real thing. They are better these days than thirty years ago, but you have to keep in mind that they are not the real thing. In other words, you have to try to appreciate them for what they are. There are some that are delicious in and of themselves, and there are some that are really close to what the original tastes like.

The one exception is cheese. Daiya is the closest I’ve found to the real thing, but I still wouldn’t eat it on its own. It has to be on something and melted. It has the right consistency and that boingy spring that cheese has when melted. Eat it on its own and cold, though? Hell, no.

I’m really grooving on the doing the Cane Form with the saber. It’s amazing how much it’s changed my feelings about both the cane and the saber. Before this, I would have put them both at the bottom of my weapons. Now, I have to say I love practicing with them. Would I put them at the top of my faves list? I wouldn’t go that far, but I have a new appreciation for them. I’m including the video of my teacher’s teacher doing it below. Yes, again, because it’s that amazing.


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More about health, mental and physical

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I’m writing more about health, and I’m going to try to stay on topic today. That’s probably not going to happen, but I like to have goals. Hope springs eternal and all that. Here is my post from yesterday.

I will say before I get started that I’m still working on the Cane Form with my new shiny saber. I polished up the second row (out of four) because there’s a move that I was having issues with while using the cane. It’s a simple block the leg move, but you can add a twirl to it. I like to add the twirl, but I felt as if I was doing it wrong. Watching my teacher’s teacher do it with the saber clarified what I was doing wrrong, and now I can do it with relative ease.

I gave myself a week to learn the third and fourth rows because they are a bit mor ecomplicated than the first two (especially the fourth row), but I don’t think that will be necessary. I got the third row with ease in two or three goes, and I’m optimistic about the fourth.

My god. My biceps are getting really hard. I have always been proud of my guns, and that pride has only grown now. My new saber is hefty, and it feels so good in my hand. I still don’t love the Saber Form, but I’m more positive about it than I have been in the past.

Back to health in general. I am trynig to cut down on how much I DoorDash, but it’s hard when it’s right there. In fair disclosure, I ordered tonight, but I did not feel good about it. I hate cooking. I hate it so much. There is nothing enjoyable about it to me, and if I never have to do it again, that will be way too soon.

I can do simple things like cooking pasta and throwing sauce, cheese, and veggies on it. I can bake a pizza, too, but that doesn’t mean I can make one. I have thought about going back to baking, but I’m not sure I want to do that if I’m trying to be healthier.

I think I have to go back to the basics. I can get a rotisserie chicken a week and then make salads and sandwiches to eat. Along with the pasta. These are very simple dishes, and I can throw any manner of veggies on top of them. I don’t mind eating the same food several days in a row, either. It’s just that when it’s six or seven, my lizard brain says, “Hey. I can just order from DoorDash, and it’ll be here in twenty minutes.”


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Health, mental and physical, and martial arts

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I’m talking about trying to be more healthy in general. I mentioned at the end of the last post that there are three things I really like a great deal. They are: writing, FromSoft games, and martial arts weapons. I already said thatt FromSoft games would be the first to go because there are tons of other games in the world. Yes, they’are not as good as FromSoft games for the most part, but there are still some really fucking good games out there. And, as I mentioned in many past posts, I’m reaching the end of actually being able to play From games so that’s easily the first one I  would drop.

*SPOILERS*

Also, they are starting to buy more and more of their hype, especially in the DLCs. Shadow of the Erdtree was incredible for design and layout. The environments were amazing. Stunning, even! The bosses, on the other hand…..eh. I mean, there are a few that are distinctive in design  such as the Putrescent Knight and Midra. They are really a sight to behold, though fight-wise, not that impressive. I think it’s because I was a caster and did not have to get up in their respective grills. Also, I fought them later than I probably should have if I wanted to play the game in a natural way. Same with Bayle. There is so muuch talk about him, and people had such trouble with him. He’s the biggest baddest dragon in all the lands. He wears one of Placidusax’s (badass optional dragon fight in the main game) heads around his neck (I think? He’s definitely wearing it somewhere) as a warning to the other dragons.

Also, there’s an NPC associated with this boss fight whom everybody loves. You first hear him (the NPC) howling on the road abotu pain and agony and how much he hates Bayle. In fact, he can’t stop going on and on about Bayle. CURSE YOU BAYLE!! There’s a funny story about how the voice actor was told to push it as hard as possible without being told why. You can tell in his voice read. And if you do his questline correctly, you can summon him for the fight. He’s the biggest hypeman you’ll ever have to help you out.

Did I love him the way everyone else does? No. Is he pretty dang cool? Yes. He’s this game’s version of Solaire, and I’ve made myself pretty clear how I feel about Solaire. Everybody loves Solaire. He is most people’s number one favorite NPC in the first game. He is not in my top five, which is not something I tell people very often. It’s Laurentius, Quelana, Onion Knight, Big Hat Logan, and…..Patches! Of course it’s Patches. Yes, I put Patches before Soliare. It’s not that I like Patches, per se, but that he’s the one constant in all the games.

Anyway. Yeah, FromSoft games are the first to go out of them, writing, and martial arts weapons. This is where we get real with it. Which would I give up next? I’ve thought about it, but I can’t give an honest answer. Writing has been a struggle for me since my medical crisis. Not my blogging, but my fiction writing. It is just not coming to me the way it used to, and it’s frustrating as fuck. I’m trying. Lord knows I’m trying.

I’m not happy because it used to flow freely before my medical crisis. I had stories in my head for days, and I could write 2,000 words a day with ease. when I buckkled down, I could do that in two hours. Usually, it was more like four, but that was fine with me. I did it at night like clockwork. I can still do the writing now, but it’s just hot shit. Honestly. Not even just first draft horseshit. It’s utter horseshit.

I can still write. I have written. I will write. Buut it’s just not good, and it hurts my heart. I have been writing since I was seven. I don’t know who I would be without it.


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Let’s talk more about health in general

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Let’s talk more about health in general. Here is yesterday’s post filled with ranting and ravings about life in general. Despite my best intentions, I went off the rails as usual. Let me try to focus on the point I want to make. Which is that family dysfunction sucks. No, wait! That’s not the point I was trying to make. My point was that it’s hard to tackle health/diet without slipping back into thinking about the eating disordered thinking that my mother has exhibited all her life.

I’m trying to be healthier withouth becoming disordered. I have not been able to do this all my life, so what makes me thinkk that I can do it now?

I think it because I have fifteen years of Taiji under my belt. I think it because I still am thankful to my body for carrying me through my medical crisis–something I should not have survived. Here’s something that many people don’t know; it’s better to be ten pounds overweight than underweight if you suffer a medical crisis. I knew this before my own medical crisis, and it’s something I tell people whenever I can. I feel like a broken record, and most people don’t want to listen. It is so engrained in us that being fat is the worst thing in the world, many people can’t fathom that maybe it’s not true.

I remember several decades ago, I was listening to NPR (or MPR. I’m pretty sure it was NPR, though), and they had a doctor on. She was saying that as you got older, you should GAIN weight, not lose it. Partly for the reason I already said (it cushions your body if anything happens to it), but also for other reasons. Which I don’t quite remember. This reason, though, is the one that stuck in my head. That it’s better to gain weight as you get older to cushion your organs in case something really bad happens to them.

Anyway. I don’t like being fat. I am being truthful in saying that while I can still appreciate what my body has done for me, I don’t like how it looks. There are several reasons for that which I’m not going to get into at this moment. I’ve done it so many times in the past and that, while relevant, is not the point of this post.

I’m trying, yet again, to be healthier without falling into the trap of only carrying about being fat. I’m doing things like walking on the hour when I remember (as I mentioned yesterday). I’m trying to be more consistent with my fruits and veggies, and I think this is a good start.


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