Nostalgia, Curiosity, Need and Nonsense


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I went for a stroll down memory lane in IronOnline’s Article Archives to see what we were discussing 10 years ago. We were bombing and blasting like there was no tomorrow. Squats and deadlifts were on the rise; training intensity was worshipped, emphasized, demanded and maximized. I was ingesting 350 grams of protein a day -- gag -- and considered cutting my workouts to five days a week lest I over train. Oh, and drink lots of water -- gulp -- please, don’t forget your water.
 
I knew I had gone back in time, but was soon convinced I was visiting creatures from another planet.
 
Wild and crazy youth! I did, however, come across a number of things that never change.
 
Discipline is timeless. Regarded by the weak as a tyrant and by the strong as a magnificent force that causes, effects and directs, there is no doubt about discipline’s incredible power. It is an absolute in achievement and shapes the world by shaping the people. Sadly, the world’s condition is also influenced by those dismal characters who avoid the great power, cannot sustain its efforts and recede into crevices as discipline passes them by.
 
Should we embrace the steely nature and apply it to good, what a wonderful world this would be. Long may the bombers, cultivating discipline’s benefits and disposed to its favors, continue their contribution to a better world.
 
Each of us has sufficient inherent discipline (instinctive or survival) to control many of our assets and faculties. We make it through the day. We simply need to add oxygen and forceful motion and regular daily practice. Like watering a wildflower taking root in a crack of soil in the tarmac of life’s vast, encroaching parking lot... don’t let it die. We need all the wildflowers we can get.
 
Discipline is not owned by repeating mantras, reading a book, watching a video or following a formula. Discipline is founded in need and desire and developed in deed. Discipline is yours. You want something, if you can’t buy it or steal it, you must work for it. The more you want and need it, the harder you try to get it. The wanting and needing, the working, trying and getting combine and eventually present discipline. Great or small, the stoic quality is a benefactor assuring you become a better person, more complete and capable and aware as you pursue your healthy and humble goal.
 
Discipline well-applied resides in the penthouse of life’s grand hotel. Laziness, its mongrel antagonist, can be found languishing in the basement or lifting its leg to the dumpster in the back alley. A hideous character, laziness leads to dullness and poverty and is inherited by the obtuse and practiced by the ignorant; there is no doubt of its corruptible weakness. Left to inertia, little is accomplished and not much is enjoyed. Fulfillment has no chance in the lax, listless leach. He limps, lumbers, loiters and lollygags.
 
About patience: The art of waiting, the skill of working dauntless and hard while nothing appears to get done, the comfort found in hopefulness day after day -- I suggest practice, practice and more practice till the bats in the belfry come home to roost in the lower pastures before the chickens hatch. You can’t stare at a pot and expect the water to boil without scorching your forehead on the steam. There’s water in the pot and fire under it, right? Good. Hang back, stay cool and attend the sights and sounds of life around you. Just don’t let the fire go out and the water evaporate. Get out the tea and cups and biscuits. We’ll have a party.
 
Patience and time are juggled by the same clown.  Time is not the problem; it’s our concept of it. Life is a continuum interrupted by manmade units separating the past from the future. The clock has its benefits, but mostly serves to capture our minds in seconds, minutes and days, weeks, months and years, always counting, always watching... tic, tic, tic. Is that the way to build big muscles and a lean figure, lose bodyfat and set a personal record -- from inside false compartments struggling to get out?
 
The stress of impatience squeezes the life out of time. It makes the moment unknowable and the present unbearable. We fret, we hurry, we become discouraged and we almost quit. Patience comes hard, slow and at a heavy price. Patience is tough and revives just as frustration prepares to wrestle us to the mat. We’re back on our feet crouched and ready, a new level of fortitude in our command.
 
We endure as the continuum stretches on. Impatience plus practice plus time equals fortitude, the first cousin of patience... once a stranger, now part of the family.
 
Thank God for iron-hearted perseverance.
 
You know all about perseverance; you’re still reading these hapless words after all this time.
 
Perseverance, steadfastness, stick-to-it-tiveness and the long-lasting forever; the determined resolve necessary to achieve, that familiar attribute set deep in the mind of the committed, motivated, patient and disciplined, the quality of the lithe racehorse that never quits, whether it wins or shows up last at the wire. With perseverance, you cannot lose. You stick to it or roll over, your breath no longer clouding the mirror. Perseverance can be hard pushing and mean or a gentle effort, kind in its application. But always, it is unceasing and interminable, positive in action and never falls short of finishing its work. About perseverance, it is undying.
 
Scuse me, bombs; it’s time to go. I’m a day late and a workout short. What I need in my life is order, inspiration and enthusiasm. A brain would help.
 
Go… Godspeed… DD

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