Exhausted...

Beyond tired..

Beyond thought..

But I feel so satisfied. Gee.. that sounds crazy.

I'm so sore that I woke up at 3 am from the pain, and the only way to get back to sleep was to go sit in a hot bath to relax my suffering body. Yep, I had just gone through a Kyokushin Belt Rank test.

I'm not done yet. I've still got Breaking boards to do. Therefore, I cannot tell you whether or not I passed this test.

Essentially, passing doesn't seem as important to me as the fact that I faced this challenge, and gave my utmost to each moment. Let me tell you.. they were LONG moments.. very long exhausting, roll your eyes to the back of your head, fall over wishing you were dead, moments.

At one point, my mind said "I want this to stop!", my body agreed totally, and I felt myself wilting, then somewhere in the depths of me my spirit said "I'm beyond this, I'm above this, I can handle this..." I felt myself focusing on my breathing, my whole mind centered on that little spot within the bottom of my body and feeling the air coming in, and down, and swirling at my center. The rest of me had this "Oh well.. we might as well do what we can to keep on because there really is no other choice right now." I found myself moving, blocking, and attacking with such a calmness that I had never felt before.

The only other time that I've felt this sort of feeling was this one time in my youth when I had done a little cross country running. I had ran into the Wall that is mentioned by many endurance runners. This Wall feels like you have no air, you have no energy, you feel like your heart is going to explode, but if you can keep going in spite of these awful feelings, you gain a second breath, and then you feel like you can run forever. I had managed to run past the wall, and surprise myself with the renewed ability. This only happened once, but I still remember that moment with a smile.

I'd like to say that I gained a second breath during my belt test, but it wasn't like that. It was more like I was still on my first breath, but I had figured out how to make it stretch a little farther.

Today, I'm exhausted. VERY satisfied with myself, and my effort, but I'm feeling the results of it... ALOT!