Separate tension from force. Developing strength does not imply generating tension. If we lift a heavy box without having strength, if we are stressed by a situation, or if we spend the whole day in front of the computer without moving with our head sunk between our shoulders, it is likely that we generate tension and therefore wear at a muscular level, but also at an energetic level. We accumulate fatigue.

When we practice, the idea is to accumulate strength, not fatigue. Collect practice after practice a little more body awareness, breathing capacity, muscle strength, joint flexibility, ability to focus, communication with our body. We could say that the combination of all of these in the right proportions results in strength.

If the joints are stiff, the muscles are tense and we breathe badly, we need a much greater effort to do anything. That's why when I think of strength I like to imagine not only the development of muscles, but a combination of resources that work intelligently, a sum that results in strength.

And what I find even more interesting is that, if we take strength in this integrated way, we can think of it not only as muscular, but also as a capacity for focus, or emotional support, or tenacity. And, depending on what we want to underpin, the rest becomes available. For example, if we are in fact looking to develop more muscular strength, our breathing, capacity of focus, emotional energy, joint flexibility will be fundamental tools to go where we want to go. Bring strength and sensitivity closer together, not further apart.

Have you registered which part of your body has more strength? Would you say that your emotional structure is strong without detracting from your sensitivity? And your thinking? How do all these variables interact in you? Let's practice! To perceive ourselves, to support what is necessary, to think of strength as the development of our potential.

It seems a polar wave is coming. Yesterday winter began. Today it rained, the sun came out, it got cloudy, it was cold, it was nice. A lot of diversity throughout the same day. If my decisions / plans had depended on the weather, I would have been a kite at the total mercy of stimuli. And if I had ignored my surroundings, I would definitely have had a bad time.

July, which is approaching, brings multiple themes, such as the weather today. It is my turn to write about freedom and discipline; Meanwhile, the furious wind of the beginning of winter blows, gets between the trees and to that clear climate of unease, which is sometimes experienced on Sundays, is added that of the restlessness of the wind, of what can apparently be, in the same way, kind and hostile.

I feel before this subject as one who sits before a small fire that shelters. In part it was because of this sometimes unthinkable duo —freedom and discipline— that years ago, one day, I decided that I wanted to teach the DeRose Method. It was the combination of those two things that I didn't know it was possible to put together. I call discipline, in my case, the ability to build anything: paint a picture, run a school, write a book of poems, sustain a bond, train something consistently (beyond the weather). I call discipline the sum of little bricks that give existence to what we want to carry out. And freedom, the way we build it. Without that reaching the point of subduing us. Being able to build, create, carry out projects, relationships, life itself without it being at our expense. It seems obvious, but it is not. That is why it often happens to us that, even doing what we like, something is not being as we wanted. And not because everything has to be as we want, far from it. But sometimes we have that clear feeling of being aware of more, that what we want to do so much is occupying places that belong to other things, even that it has lost its course and overflows everywhere.

I thought that freedom and discipline permeate the way we train in schools, but also our way of teaching, working and building. Not because we always do well, but because it is a variable that we take into account when making decisions, I would almost say when doing anything.

Discipline brings us the possibility of building. Freedom, to establish a bond with what we are creating, whether individually or collectively; a loving, considerate, powerful, channeled and therefore lasting bond. I don't know if you've ever wondered how freedom and discipline coexist in you, but know that they are a great duo and, when they go hand in hand in a project, they unleash unexpected potential.

In this day and age when we receive such a large and constant stream of stimuli and are thinking about so many things at once, it is sometimes difficult for our brains to understand what we want to have an idea about, insight or, the sometimes called, wow moment!

1➡ Define the issue and dial it in.
Which of all these thousands of things we are processing simultaneously are we most interested in? Once we have the answer it is a matter of giving it a priority place in our world, as if among all the thoughts this one is marked with a highlighter.How do you do that? With time, place, intensity and affection. That is, giving it priority and daily in our mental agenda, taking advantage of the moments of more vitality and lucidity to think about it. And finally approaching this idea with the energy of enthusiasm for something that matters to us.

2➡ Give room for the idea to emerge and write it down.
It is important to know that for an idea to emerge it is necessary, as DeRose would say, to reverse the flow of perception and stop bombarding information from the outside in. This can be done, for example, by training concentration on a simple image such as the image of a sun, for a few minutes, trying not to disperse ourselves. This also develops our ability to focus, in this case, allows new ideas to emerge, that is, to make room for them. And at that moment it is important to have a notebook at hand where to write them down (here an important detail, better a notebook than a cell phone, that just by opening it already proposes us a thousand new ways to disperse and probably leads us to lose that beautiful and incipient idea that was being born).

3➡ And finally, as Picasso used to say: Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.