Of all days, I would injure myself on a non-resistance day. In about 35 minutes of my Do-San session, I simply threw a backfist in a front stance and felt something in my back akin to the tension when I first stretch in the morning; immediately after, all of my movements were in pain in the pattern. It's a simple move, no different from throwing a punch, and Do-San only has two backfists in it—clearly, the injury had nothing to do with fatigue. That said, Friday's bagwork included a forearm/backfist combo, so that must have weakened it.

Regardless, it's not my left foot but my right lats that is the first to go in my training. That said, I'm still dealing with left foot pain. I work through it getting off the treadmill during its crescendo and hop on the bike, where I can shift contact with the pedal to minimize risk.

I finished up my cardio for the day and have been healing up my lats with Tiger Balm, stretches, and massages. Tomorrow is a rest day, but I hope it heals up by Monday as any resistance day would be difficult, and Monday is actually the one for my back.

Today was my fantasy music day, though towards the end I listened to Demon Hunter as injuries tend to forge me in reflection. This is a new song for me and intersects the path I'm upon:

Demon Hunter – One Step Behind

Fearless
Open your eyes to learn
To feel the rising sea
Hear me
Don't let them in
To waste away your everything
...
Father
Forevermore
In dark, in light, remember me
Searching
Find in the name
The truth, the right, and take the lead

It parallels my soul's thirst for more—the call and the prayer. I've made promising inroads toward physical restoration. But, I've ignored my soul's enrichment and acumen. While most accept a mind, body, and spirit division, I see it as a body and soul union: there is the machine and the one who is driving it. When the soul is unbalanced, the body follows suit. This physical revitalization will be shortly-lived if the spirit is not fed and invigorated. I'll be increasing my focus in my soul's development in the upcoming days and weeks ahead. I must feed my soul for it to flourish into my physique...

For all that was spectacular about yesterday's Ancestral Music was flipped in the other direction with this morning's music. Check out these two from yesterday; they're awesome:

https://open.spotify.com/album/4Ir9Mw8uEYlIipN6hBeBsP?highlight=spotify:track:0hjczqsEDgNhPTd8JLUlbq

https://open.spotify.com/album/6vohdbsWGcqbqiAimhGj6N?highlight=spotify:track:3VzPylMTBhGNAiHRd9rmTV

I had looked forward to for my days my Friday morning with Today's Country Music. I don't know if I've changed or it has moved on, but I just couldn't get into it for a workout session, despite being broad with my choices, whether love ballads or hard band metal ecstasy. Clearly, it's just me, for an entire industry has buy-in, but it just sounds to me like how pop used to be. There's WAY too many songs for my palate about phones and text messages. I mean, yeah, we had one back in the day, and it was Travis Tritt's Here's a Quarter, Call Someone Who Cares!

After my initial thrust, I chose the Wild Country Spotify playlist. A few songs in, there is a song by an artist with the name of Cash Campbell. I thought to myself that here is a guy that could be really good, or he might as well just call himself Garth Strait to attract playback. I listened to his Don't Wanna Think About It and just shook my head and didn't want to think about it. That CAN'T be Country today.

Like the Vedder lyric, "I changed by not changing at all." I immediately flipped to an old favorite from '96 that might as well be today's Country:

https://open.spotify.com/album/68wdXsJmyuDfbozV2rDjXq?highlight=spotify:track:7xQYVjs4wZNdCwO0EeAWMC

To help me through the rest of my iron session, I quickly threw an emergency playlist for this sort of thing and whipped out my mullet:

• Rock You Like A Hurricane – Scorpions
• Round and Round – Ratt
• Cum on Feel the Noize – Quiet Riot
• Nobody's Fool – Cinderella
• Turn up the Radio – Autograph
• Iron Fist Main Titles – Trevor Morris
• L'Estasi Dell'oro (The Ecstasy Of Gold) – 2004 Digital Remaster – Ennio Morricone
• I'm A Dragon feat. Sway – Original Mix – Apashe
• Memphis Fight Song – Memphis Tigers – Live – The Mighty Sound of the South Marching Band
• Not Strong Enough – Apocalyptica

So, I'm back to the drawing board for what I should play on Fridays, my Arms & Abs day.

Another workout is in the books and with the Nordic drums propeling me on, I come away from it completely spent. Briefly while failingly to perform Dan Gun to my satisfaction, for I screwed up by doing my shoulders regimen before my forms, I thought the whole TB12 method of no weights was the way to go. It's funny how robotic and non-agile I was while doing my Taekwondo pattern after the shoulders exercises.

My dad always advised against lifting and he was a 2nd degree in California in the '60s, when they weren't a dime-a-dozen, which included training overseas; he also was a boxing champion as a two-tour Vietnam Marine Corps Recon Sniper after serving in the Army in Korea—he enlisted at 16; a pro fighter; an LAPD officer during those chaotic times; and even in his late 40s as a Shelby County Sheriff's Deputy, would bust into houses in the middle of the night on fugitive warrants. He developed a wealth of applicable strength.

Now, that wasn't his whole story of course, for he was a thinker as well as a fighter. Born during the Great Depression and picking cotton by hand at the age of 4, he was an ESFP with a 158 IQ with a 7th grade education until he went to USC to earn a degree in Graphics Design with a minor in Political Science which led to the eventual starting of his own printing business. He once walked off a job because his boss told him he would fire him if he didn't stop whistling while he was running two printing presses at the same time! I was born when he was 40 and he remains my hero even though it's now been 14 years since we last talked. He introduced me to my favorite music group, Simon & Garfunkel and we shared a love for Elvis. Awesome guy. As the Shinedown lyric goes:

All my heroes are dead and gone
But they're inside of me
They still live on

So if a guy like that doesn't put a lot of emphasis into lifting heavy, neither do I. I know everyone in the bodybuilding community seemingly loves squats, but they're the dumbest thing to me. In what scenario does that actually happen to me? I mean, maybe if I lived in a 3rd world country and had to bring back water to the village via water buckets and a pole...no, it's a silly thought and I don't do silly exercises. If I was just in it for the looks, I'd just save a lot of sweat equity and use makeup shading. For my money, a lunge is the superior and far more applicable to life.

But for now, it's all academic as I need to drop additional weight as I don't feel safe with my knees, a once bane of mine, but have been silent for years. I'm likely to bring lunges back into my life in July.