Action Without Struggle: The Discovery of Allowing

A couple of weeks ago I had an interesting experience at the gym. Before my weight workout, I played a little with a soccer ball, hitting some passes against the wall and playing with a dribbling technique I've been exploring. Then I did my weight workout, which included a few exercises that target the legs. After I was done, I went back to the gym to play with the ball again. I discovered that I could kind of let the leg hang and then let the whole weight of it swing from my core rather than use my muscles to swing it. It's kind of hard to put into words. It was like I let myself truly feel its weight and then I allowed its weight to swing. When I succeeded, the result was effortless power. It was almost like I wasn't even using my muscles.

I thought back to a time over the Labor Day weekend when I was watching many hours of the U.S. Open and thought I had an insight about how the pros hit overheads so hard, so I went to the tennis courts by my house to experiment. Basically, I tried to feel the racquet heavy in my hand, and then I allowed the weight of the arm and racquet to swing rather than swinging it. I still remember the last overhead I hit that day. I was using an old ball with very little bounce. My smash landed in the service box across the net and then bounced clean over the fence.

I'm still struggling to put this insight--for it does feel very much like an insight--into words. Right now I'm calling it allowing. The experience of it is action entirely without struggle. I'm very new to the sensation, but I'm exploring it every chance I get. As I continue to experiment, I'll share here what I learn.

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