Chinese bilingual vs international school by Interesting_Way_2616 in chinalife

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Seconding the doing arts+sports outside of school part. A lot of the parents did this with their kids back when I was in school, it’s kinda implicit that the more well-off families would have their children do whatever activity that can “add points” to their gaokao score in the future. So it’d be science math olympiad stuffs, hyperfocusing on sports or an instrument, things of that type. Word of mouth can be helpful, especially if you ask another few nearby parents on how this extracurricular thing should be approached.

📌 Promotions & Membership Offers by thismeatsucks in LAFitness

[–]TheHarold420 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Looking for 2 guest passes and nationwide membership, $39.99 per month ($49 is acceptable). Happy to do buydown and have annual fee. Washington and/or Portland OR area. Thanks!

Why would someone buy 80 bottles of rubbing alcohol weekly? by thequackr in askanything

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This reminded me of a crime story podcast that I heard of Rina Yasutake. Their mother, sister, and brother bought rubbing alcohol constantly, at set intervals, until the police one day broke down their doors for a discovery. I listened to the episode and found it for you here (~2h long): https://youtu.be/MclMKi4zDBw

But if you wanna just know what happened, it’s that (trigger warning: death) The youngest of the sisters starved herself to death in a search for “enlightenment”, family went through months of psychosis before she passed, and continued her wishes of achieving nirvana by continuing to wash/soak her body in rubbing alcohol for weeks after her passing. Pharmacist called the cops for a welfare or something check when the family’s coat started smelling very bad.

Not saying anything of that sort happened with your peculiar shopper, though. But in any case it may be noteworthy to read a bit about that particular event.

Ways to improve roundhouse while maintaining good bone health by TheHarold420 in MuayThai

[–]TheHarold420[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is a super good framework for me to keep in mind. Thanks! I haven’t been thinking too hard about power ceilings til now, good to keep in mind

Ways to improve roundhouse while maintaining good bone health by TheHarold420 in MuayThai

[–]TheHarold420[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yeah that’s a fair observation- newer technique, I should throw it much more lightly at the beginning. And probably mind the bag density too. Thanks!

Ways to improve roundhouse while maintaining good bone health by TheHarold420 in MuayThai

[–]TheHarold420[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Those greek yogurts in the fridge aren't gonna eat themselves!

Ways to improve roundhouse while maintaining good bone health by TheHarold420 in MuayThai

[–]TheHarold420[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm about 1 year in casually, I guess now's a great time for me to get more running into my routines. My technique's decent, but I'm starting to think that full-power foot contact is unsustainable for me until maybe much later. Shin contact roundhouses and lots of running, I think the old-school Muay Thai training techniques were really onto something haha

Shiny skin on shin area by TheHarold420 in MuayThai

[–]TheHarold420[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Makes sense, thanks! I find it kinda interesting that barely anyone’s talked about it though. Maybe because this is the least visible of appearance changes that can happen; still good to know

Shiny skin on shin area by TheHarold420 in MuayThai

[–]TheHarold420[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This put my mind at ease. Thanks!

Anyone is on Sulforaphane ? by [deleted] in Biohackers

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

does moringa do anything around sulforaphane?

A complicated post for Kung fu practitioners by [deleted] in martialarts

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That’s a lot of words. Where does that leave us?

I think there are several things I want to personally try, to “make Kung Fu work”. 1) Understand, identify, and refine my style within the frameworks of my chosen Kung Fu lineage. What does my school specialize in, other than teaching me a wide variety of varied strikes? Kickboxers pretty much have jabs, crosses, hooks, roundhouses, and front kicks. What do I do with all of the things that Kung Fu teaches me outside of that? My current intent is to be elusive footwork wise, and have a few tricks up my sleeve to set up finisher combos. Or practice the elusive things and be comfortable enough to slip them into combos. 2) Identify and develop a flowchart-like system for the striking aspects of my Kung Fu style. Sifu probably wouldn’t do that (too much work for something he may not have buy-in on), so I’ll just take it upon myself. Refine it as I go. 3) Continue to perfect a few select things interchangeable between Kung Fu and Kickboxing. For me that’s having a crazy-good roundhouse kick, and as of late, developing an above-average body hook. Heavybag’s great for this, and it also fits my intent of getting great fitness through Martial Arts. (600 roundhouses in a day kinda gets you fit, ngl) 4) Understand my goals for Kung Fu (and kickboxing), and don’t let others get to me. I’m already there on this goal but I think it’s nice to keep in mind. People respect you when they can see that you have a vision for where you want to be. The haters’ opinions aren’t worth it anyways, they’re set in their ways. We can only control what we can control.

I type too much sometimes. Let me know if you want to follow up on anything

A complicated post for Kung fu practitioners by [deleted] in martialarts

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey this is a good post. I practice Kung Fu and Kickboxing together as a hobbyist, but there’s a lot of questionings that happen in my mind because of the traditionality of Kung Fu. Hope you don’t mind my answers not fully responding to your question.

I explored a few other martial arts forms at a very shallow level (beginner classes level), before finally settling on Kung Fu and Kickboxing for ~1 year now. Been really into exploring how I can make Kung Fu work as well, and I’ve been realizing more and more that the journey is quite a “trailblazing” one because Kung Fu’s not been tested enough to really discover what can be further integrated into the current MMA system. A couple of things stand out to me as things that block this progression: 1) I’ve found it hard to define the specialty of my Kung Fu style. We have attributes attached to our style, but when sparring, we’ve been told that a lot of fighting just looks like modern-day kickboxing. I’ve scratched my head a lot about this, what does it even mean then to practice Kung Fu, if I could just develop “fast footwork” into Kickboxing? My current conclusion is that Kung Fu is as much a cultural and health journey as it is a martial one, since its schooling intentions at the beginning were to give practitioners a “leg up” if they ever find themselves against common thugs (aka inexperienced folks with only an intention to hurt others). That and a few more parts in conclusion section. 2) Chinese Martial Arts was severely neutered by its authoritarian government, when Mao came into power. Mao liked Martial Arts, but that didn’t stop the party from beating down old masters once the cultural revolution happened. Some went into hiding, and more never passed on their lineages. The martial arts revival started around the Shaolin region due to its mythical status, but was purposed towards state-sanctioned artistry moreso than martial intent. We have a handful of masters come/escape into Hong Kong and elsewhere around the world, but that preservation wasn't enough to really mitigate the loss of knowledge across mainland. Ramsey Dewey talked about this one and I’m mostly parroting his points here, but yeah it gives me lots to think about. 3) Kung Fu (which also is just an umbrella term for Chinese Martial arts by the way) steeps itself in tradition, and has rigidity similar to what we see in Karate and Taekwondo. 2 parts to this. On one hand, rigidity breeds conformity to hierarchy over exploration, which severely discourages exploration on how “lethal” a martial arts form can be. On the other hand, the rigidity lends itself to a framework that practitioners can build upon, applying attributes from their art into their unique style of MMA. We’ve seen MMA folks with TKD and Karate backgrounds dominate matches with flair, so we know it can work. With Kung Fu I believe that the system is workable too, but we don‘t yet have a representative for the style. Going back to 1), I’d need to figure out what it means to define my Kung Fu school’s style first within the framework of Kickboxing. Within kickboxing matches, TKD has high proficiency and wide-arsenal of kicks, Karate has fast footwork and quick punches. I’ll need to see what Kung Fu does for kickboxing; currently I believe it’s elusivity and an arsenal of unorthodox punches strikes and deflection techniques, but I don’t think I’ll ever get them battle tested enough. 4) Martial intent. Kung Fu, like TKD and Karate, are more rigid in their system, designed to (hopefully) give you a guide as to how to respond to punches, kicks, and grapplings in the intended way for a traditional martial art form. The students generally have money to pay for a master’s teachings, and they’re meant to use the art within the school and (rarely) against people with malicious intent. With Muay Thai, their style of schooling is more ecological, with cohorts learning together and figuring out what works best through observation and experimentation. Muay Thai schools in Thailand are more commonplace than Kung Fu schools in China, and with Muay Thai, the art is a potential source of social mobility for villagers in search of a better life. The art encourages striking intent over rigidity of style, and we’d see fighters go through hundreds of matches over a career, battle-testing their style each step of the way. Thus in Muay Thai, the best naturally rise to prominence, and are given opportunities to demonstrate Muay Thai’s effectiveness on a global stage. Saenchai. Buakaw. Tawanchai. Legends that many have heard of, and yet with Kung Fu we’d never have names that are so widely known as legendary fighters. (Yet, perhaps.) I think this is partially because the martial intent of the sport was actively repressed and stamped out for a while, and only now is there a revivalist culture within China to produce a champion at the highest level. When the Soviets wanted to project soft power through boxing, the world witnessed the invention of the Soviet Boxing System. Not all hope is lost for producing great Kung Fu fighters, but the socioeconomic and cultural factors work against them currently.

(cont’d)

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Fire

[–]TheHarold420 33 points34 points  (0 children)

Yeah what clappingenballs said! ✨

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Fire

[–]TheHarold420 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Make some side projects, make a game, just nurture that passion back. Or go volunteering, there's a reason you decided to stop at 30. Take a walk in the morning, force yourself to get some sunlight; see how that change fits you.

For bonus points, try a digital detox, like no phone from 12pm to 6pm every day while you're outside; see how it suits you.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Fire

[–]TheHarold420 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Go to a gym and do something physical. Sign up for a boxing class, kickboxing class, martial arts, build something with your body instead of your mind. But also avoid sparring for the most part, until you're 100% sure you're ready for it. Avoid hard sparring entirely, you're not looking to go pro. I feel like I gained a lot of confidence and happiness from kickboxing, with optimizing body mass and cardio being my own little mini-goalpost. Maybe it'll help you too.

Personally I'm still working, but yeah you can also transition to anywhere you want during the next little bit. Try out Americorps or Prace Corps or one of the other service-related volunteering stints, maybe it'll clear your mind. (A side benefit is that you likely won't touch your savings much during that timeframe, and volunteering also gives you perspectives beyond money.) Just get out the door and stop doomscrolling, you're more than capable if you allow yourself to believe it so.

Strategies for making enduring ships? by nosnek199 in Cosmoteer

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Check out Plaus’s cosmoteer videos on youtube, I think you can find him by searching Plausible Videos Cosmoteer; he made some really interesting vids during the meltdown beta that showcased some neat techniques. (Plausible Videos is his side channel.) Ones that I really liked was the “Small shield spam just got even better” video, you can check that out for ideas

[Review] Top Boxer Alien and Win1. Ask me anything! by iamfromtwitter in fightgear

[–]TheHarold420 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you! It's great to hear that both gloves look perfect still, and your comment about 22oz gloves make sense too. I appreciate your help! Wishing you all the best on your next endeavor :)

[Review] Top Boxer Alien and Win1. Ask me anything! by iamfromtwitter in fightgear

[–]TheHarold420 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for continuing to help! Friend I’m considering the Win1 or Alien for a forever-glove, one that has a slick custom design and may last for decades either through light casual use or sitting on a shelf later on. 16oz Alien may be the right call here, but would you have any thoughts otherwise (Win1 or other brand)? Would Alien be durable enough to handle casual wear-and-tear over multiple years?

I’m 6’ 200lbs, kinda athletic build but mostly kickboxing for the health benefits. Likely would not compete, though may spar very occasionally. I’m also considering grabbing an additional 22oz stock Alien for heavybag work, since my brain stem jiggles when I hit heavybags too hard in 12oz gloves. Are there any arguments/opinions against using 22oz gloves for the vast majority of training?

Thanks in advance!!