Dr. Mark Cheng: Professional resumes, CVs, & a long-overdue clarification

Recently, I've been getting quite a few more requests for different workshops, and occasionally the hosts ask me for a resume or a CV or some other sort of info about me to help them promote the workshops or events.

Over the years, I've written & re-written so many different CVs for different projects & hosts that trying to look through all the different PDFs & files to update them has gotten to be chore that I don't have the bandwidth for, especially when they ask for skill-specific CVs.

Why the difficulty with skill-specific curricula vitae? 

Because my life and my passions are INSEPARABLE from my professional pursuits. The toughest thing is having to explain over & over again that the combat arts are traditionally inseparable from the traditional healing arts as well. While more & more people are clear on that reality, it's always time consuming to have to explain over & over again that my martial arts training (especially with some of my early teachers) is part & parcel of my medical education.

Oh! You're the kettlebell guy! The acupuncture guy! The martial arts guy! The rehab guy! The Tai-Chi guy!.... Actually, step back about 50 feet and take a big picture look at what I do. 

People love to look at specific things to be able to compartmentalize. That gives them a better sense of security, of feeling like they know what something or someone is about. But that's just not who or what I am, how I operate, or how the real world is on a practical level. People who are hardcore specialists are awesome, but I'm a guy who prefers to see life in a multifactorial perspective.

In ancient times, martial arts masters were recognized as such for their practical understanding of the human body. They understood the training methods that made it work better. They understood the techniques to disable or dismember it. To be able to retain students and pass on their teachings, they also understood how to effectively treat and rehabilitate the injuries that occurred in combat training. My whole life has been centered around this reality, and there's no distinction in my heart between strength training, functional movement, manual medicine, acupuncture, herbology, injury rehab, combat sports, and tactical science.

Similarly, the hours that I've spent on studying strength training, movement screening, and diagnostic/rehab methods also fit in perfectly with martial arts by improving performance and reducing downtime from injuries.

Nonetheless, everything I just said still has to meet the public on its level of understanding before changing the paradigm. So I'm still going to post my 2 basic CVs, focusing on:

1. Human Performance & Rehabilitation (with a sub-section on Strength Training)
2. Martial Arts & Combatives Research

I'll edit these & update them as errors or omissions are brought to my attention. BIG thanks go to each & every one of you who has reminded me countless times to get this info up online. As someone who is already pretty damn busy with all of my clinical, writing, researching, & teaching.

Human Performance & Rehabilitation
Emperor's College of Traditional Oriental Medicine, Santa Monica, CA - Masters Degree Traditional Oriental Medicine (MTOM) 2002
State of California - Acupuncture Licensure (L.Ac. designation) 2003
American Liberty University, Fullerton, CA - Doctorate Degree: Acupuncture & Chinese Medicine (PhD) 2005
Functional Movement Systems, Chatham, VA - Faculty Member 2010-present
Emperor's College of Traditional Oriental Medicine & Yosan University - former faculty member (Tui-Na)

Strength Training
Russian Kettlebell Instructor Certification - RKC 2006, personal student of founder, Pavel Tsatsouline
TRX Suspension Training Sports Medicine certification 2012-present
StrongFirst Kettlebell Certification - Senior SFG Instructor 2012-present

Multimedia:
Functional Movement Systems - Kettlebells From the Ground Up 1 & 2
MovementLectures.com - Prehab-Rehab 101: The Groundwork Progressions

Martial Arts & Combatives Research
California Institute of Technology, Assistant Tai Chi Instructor to Prof. Daniel K. Lee 1991-1992
UCLA Kung-Fu Club, Founder 1993-1997
Black Belt Magazine, Contributing Editor 1996 - present
American Combat Shuai-Chiao Association, Black Belt Instructor certification
Gee Yung Sil Lum Fut Ga Martial Arts Association, Instructor certification
Yod Khun Pon Thai Martial Arts Association, Level 1 Instructor certification
Inosanto International Martial Arts Instructors Association, certified Jeet Kune Do & Inosanto Kali Instructor certification 2014

Multimedia:
Dragon Door Publications - Kettlebell Warrior: Applied Combat Kettlebells for Maximum Martial Power
Unique Publications - Combat Tai-Chi
Beachbody - Tai Cheng
Black Belt Publications - Hwa Rang Do: Defend, Take Down, Submit, co-authored with Taejoon Lee
Chen Kuan Book Co., LTD - Chan Chiao: The Art & Science of Combat Shuai-Chiao, assistant translator & editor, authored by David C.K. Lin

Endure the pain of discipline or suffer the pain of regret!

This started out as a blogpost that I began over a month ago, but as one of my business consultants said to me this morning, "Lots of good stuff you have gets lost when you're one of those guys who has to keep too many plates spinning."

But this is an important topic that I didn't want to let slide. There are so many thoughts that pop into my head for blogging & writing & recording & podcasting that I really need to have a dedicated multimedia assistant working with me on a regular basis to get more of this $h!# out to you on a more regular basis. I understand that this is an issue for me, and I'm working as best I can on creating a change in processes that will streamline the flow of what will hopefully be useful information out to you. And I really need to thank each & every one of you that's been dropping me messages of encouragement, offering your expertise & help, and sharing my posts all over Facebook, Twitter, and the rest of the web.

You inspire me..... and because of that, I want to leave you with this bit of inspiration as we head into the Holiday season. [EDIT: Yes, I started writing this well before the holidays.]

*********************

More than a month ago, one of my dear friends, Jason Ferruggia posted an awesome tweet that I hold VERY close to my heart.

“Endure the pain of discipline or suffer the pain of regret.” You choose.
— Jason Ferruggia (@JasonFerruggia) November 2, 2014

To me, this is one of the most powerful sentences in training, in sport, and in life... and it is also one of the most grossly misunderstood.

For far too many who read that sentence, the words "pain", "discipline", and "regret", are the ones that stand out, so the reflexive interpretation in American society is that even if you have pain, you need to show discipline by not quitting. Otherwise, you'll regret it. Unfortunately, I think there's been a myopic view of that sentence that has damned countless athletes and injured no shortage of children.

Some folks have adopted the mindset that 'not quitting" means not changing anything and just putting more effort in, even when it's causing you pain or hampering your performance. In those situations, people have mistaken stubbornness for discipline, and I've seen that well-meaning but critical error victimize everyone from youth athletes to rehab patients.

As my big bro, Mark Reifkind (former Master SFG, ultra-marathoner, powerlifter, gymnast, & probably Mossad operative trainer) has said, "Consistency trumps intensity every time."

Let's define "consistency" as "dedication to a pursuit". 

Your pursuit can be an athletic goal, such as placing in a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) championship, winning a team trophy like the Stanley Cup in hockey, or even something as simple as being able to make it through your wife's salsa class without fatigue or physical pain... because the mental anguish is out of my field of expertise ;-). 

Your pursuit could be a medical one, such as surviving cancer, reintegrating smoothly into civilian society after a particularly harrowing deployment, or getting back on the mat after ACL reconstruction. 

Your pursuit could be a social one, such as learning how to take criticism without getting defensive, overcoming paralyzing shyness, or becoming comfortable with public speaking. 

Regardless of the pursuit itself, we need to be clear about 3 things:

1. Being clear on our short and long term goals
2. Being honest with our performance
3. Being open to guidance

Once we're clear on those, let me just pick one goal in particular in the interest of time... say, conquering a strength training goal, like a PR (personal record) military press.

This was a bottoms-up press that the photographer liked better at an angle. Nothing helps you appreciate rest more than when your photographer is taking multiple shots of you in mid-lift, changing lenses & angles! ;-)

So perhaps it goes something like this...

1) You work hard & consistently every day to increase your press training volume (number of reps). You don't miss days on your program and don't give excuses. You're the ideal athlete and you steadily increase your loads and your performance.... OR you skip days every now & then and decide that you'll just pile on more reps and "go harder" the next time you train to "make up" for your inconsistency. 

2) As you work on improving your press, you plateau out at a weight that's less than your goal regardless of your level of consistency (or inconsistency). 

HERE, where the honesty counts, is where lots of people are made or broken. In this case, you can either, seek out where your form was suboptimal, forcing you to struggle harder than you needed to and likely steering you towards injury, OR you could just stubbornly drive through even harder with more mental dedication in spite of physical deterioration. 

The second of the 2 choices MAY get you to your result, but it won't be sustainable. Your pursuit of that PR press may have forced your rotator cuff, scalenes, and other structures into such profound compensation that you injured yourself badly enough to need a surgical intervention for the numbness, weakness, and/or pain that your arm is now experiencing.

3) When you realize that your performance has plateaued and you can't improve any further on your own, seeking out the guidance of a true expert (and actually taking their advice) can make all the difference in the world. 

Let's say that you seek out a world-class physical therapist (like Dr. Ann Wendell or Dr. Charlie Weingroff) to help you clear up what's causing you the pain, and let's say that they advise you that there are some neck and thoracic spine issues, along with some trigger points, that need clearing up. You're told to stay off loaded overhead lifts (get-ups, presses, snatches, jerks, and even pull-ups) until you've demonstrated an effortless, pain-free range of motion unloaded.

You can either adhere to their advice, put your favorite lift on the sideline for now, go through their prescribed treatment protocols, and troubleshoot all of the dysfunctional movement patterns that were sabotaging your lift in the first place and move past your plateau... OR, since you second guess the experts you sought out, you can still continue to train your press because you might be 3 months away from something like your StrongFirst SFG Level 1 certification, and you're afraid that not pressing will make you weak.

In the latter case, you're being dishonest with yourself and with the person you sought out for guidance and help. And as a result, you just might manage to make it through whatever athletic event you're training for, but you'll be injured for a long time afterwards. Instead of being the picture of strength and embodiment of the ideals you're trying to teach your fitness clients, you'll be the picture of a dumb jock or jock-ette who didn't listen to the professionals who were trying to teach you how to avoid that injury in the first place. What's worse is that you'll likely turn into one of those washed up athletes-turned-coaches who does nothing but sell dreams of his/her glory days to unsuspecting clients who'll likely be injured trying to follow the same methods you used.

See, what most people fail to understand in the over-glorified worlds of sports, athleticism, fitness, and even work is that oftentimes less is more if you have the right priorities. So when Jason Ferruggia posts that you need to endure the pain of discipline, that discipline, when you're not getting the results you want, sometimes takes the form of having the self-control of pulling yourself back enough to take a different approach to the same goal. 

Gray Cook often shares his vignette about taking professional football players off of the squat rack and having them focus on individualized corrective exercise progressions until their Functional Movement Screen scores are "2s on everything with no asymmetries or pain" for months. When these world-class athletes return to their usual strength and conditioning workouts, they're often shocked to see that they not only didn't lose strength, but oftentimes increase their max lifts. The key here is that they had the discipline to follow directions and not just do more of the same. 

Einstein has been well-quoted as saying that insanity is doing the same thing over & over and expecting a different result. Now while that term has been used to brand a workout routine, let's not get it twisted. If you're not getting past the plateaus or the pain that's in your way, it's time to reassess your strategy, your honesty, and your discipline. Regret is a poison that never leaves your soul, so make sure you deal with the factors that contribute to it!