Tuesday student practice, and I was the only one who showed up. All the students are supposedly in the middle of finals, but then again it's really REALLY cold in an unheated gym these days. So Kanai-san and I had the whole place to ourselves for 2 hours. I spent most of it in front of the mirror trying to figure out how to cut horizontally. Obviously, I failed.
Wednesday at practice in Akihabara Naganuma-sensei congratulated me for making 3dan, and then after watching me do some forms, tore me up into little tiny pieces: "Good thing you didn't test with me, I wouldn't have passed you." He then proceeded to school me for several minutes on all the little and big things I was and wasn't doing. "You're left handed, so use that strength to carry the blade. Why do you kill your own strength? Your horizontal cuts aren't; the blade is titled, making waves, and you're not using you hips. And it's slow. Your sword tip wobbles around, and when it stops it's not pointing anywhere useful. Where's your opponent? Where are you cutting? Is that how you were taught to hold a sword?"
At the end he gave his patented Naganuma Smile and finished "I've never once thought I was any good. Not once. So there's no way you should either. I don't criticize you to make you feel bad, I do it because if you think you're any good, you never will be. You get better by realizing how bad you are, and trying to fix what's broken. You have potential, you've got a fingernail grip in 3dan, and from now on it gets serious. You've shown dedication to make it this far, but the things you could get away with up until now won't cut it anymore, literally."
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