Pie and Meditation

Been in the mood for pie making lately. Making pie is a bit of an art, a bit of magic and a bit of luck. Plus, I don't know of a single person that will turn down a slice all oozing with fruity goodness. Last week blueberry, this time strawberry rhubarb. Historically I don't have good luck with strawberry pie. Tends to come out runny, no matter what. I'm fooling around with a new crust, too. Even the fails taste pretty good, tho.

Was flitting around YouTube while the last pie was in the oven and ran across these polar opposite videos on archery. Competition at it's highest level vs not needing to hit the target at all.

The first one is the gold medal match of the 2010 European Tournament of Archery in Nimes, France.
Loud music, crowd cheering, flashing lights, high pressure. The need for focus and to tune out everything is paramount.

The second is a Kyudo - zen archery ceremony 
Bowing, respectful crowd, quiet ceremony. "It is not the target you aim at, it is finding yourself in the target," that is the purpose. Focus is everything.

Many high-performance archers use forms of meditation to help them focus and stay calm during stressful shooting conditions. Westerners don't traditionally use or are taught meditation and I think learning to focus is harder for us in general because of that. Not impossible, just harder to know where to begin. My gut feeling is that is part of why the Korean teams have been so powerful. Would be interesting to know if the US team has adopted that as part of their training program.

The pie set up overnight and is much better this morning. Best kind of breakfast there is.