Cockspur Hawthorn a.k.a. Crataegus crus-galli
Walk the Earth: Mettle Maker #260
Before you train, warm-up thoroughly for at at least 8 minutes. Do 2-3 minutes each of (a) jumping rope or footwork (b) light calisthenics and (c) shadowboxing, forms, light heavy bag work, or 8 minutes of MBF. Here's a fun MBF warm-up: 8 minutes of as low-intensity 4-rep sets of HSPU, Shots, Spike Sprawls, and Side Deadfalls.
Farmer walks to the death. I had been on a weightlifting plateau for a bit. But when I took the advice of the legendary Dan John and expanded my heavy carries to include farmer walks (I've been doing Bearhug Carry for a couple of years -- see below) all my numbers starting going up again. Plateau broken! Here's a good Farmer Walk program: Train every other day. Start with a light weight. Walk off 25 yards, rest 1 minute, walk 25 yards, rest 1 minute and then walk as far as you can ("to the death"). Next session, add 5 lbs to each side. When you get to a point where you can't get 3 x 25 yards, de-load 10% and start the progression again. Pro tip: Bend your knees when you pick up the weights, as if you're deadlifting.
Circumnavigate your opponent's jab. Try this jab counterpunch drill on your heavy bag. Set timer for rounds of 3:00/1:00 and practice your L. Jab counters -- just make sure you really imagine that hand coming at you. Round 1: Slide inside to avoid opponent's jab as you fire your own jab back at his nose. Next iteration, Jab twice. Next iteration after that, Jab thrice. Then reset to 1 Jab and continue. Assuming you're a righty, you should be circling the bag in a clockwise direction. Round 2: Slip outside and Jab to "the mark" (solar plexus), and come back with an Right Hook to the body and a Left Hook to the jaw. Round 3: Slip outside and Jab to "the mark" (solar plexus), then weave inside and fire a 1-2 to his nose. If you're still feeling chipper, switch stance and do all three rounds again with hands reversed. If none of this makes sense, sounds like you could stand to take one of my classes or sign up for one of my distance learning programs (see below).
Go on a wild plant walk. Why? So you can impress your friends and wow the ladies with your cool horticultural know-how, of course! But mainly to build a connection with the world around you, to get out from in front of your laptop screen, and to maybe save yourself in a survival situation. Get yourself a sturdy blank book (or make one out of paper grocery bags like I did) and start pasting in leaves and adding sketches. You'll know hundreds of species before you know it. Get dirty!
Walk the earth. This month's spiritual symbol is The Staff. All of the figures from history, myth and fiction who carry a staff -- Moses, Aaron from the Bible, Gandalf, Rafiki, Hermes with this caduceus, the Hermit card from your Tarot deck, and so forth -- walk the earth with integrity, chastity, poverty and obedience. Integrity is the condition that manifests when you are unified in your thoughts, desires, actions and beliefs. Poverty is the state of putting material possessions, money, and worldly things at the bottom of your attention. Chastity is the healthy ordering of your sexual desires. Obedience is alignment of one's entire being with Logos -- the Divine Order of the Cosmos -- or Christ. And here's the incredible thing: if you do those four things, nothing else matters. Remember in Pulp Fiction when Jules says "I'm going to walk the earth" and Vincent says "you're going to be a bum"? Jules has seen and acknowledged a miracle, and he can't go back. He has apprehended the ultimate truth, which is simply this. It doesn't matter what you do, but rather how you do it.