When Exercise is Too Hard, People Just Don't (Can't) Do It

Almost all the thought and energy goes towards making exercise and activities harder -- rather than making them easier and more possible (probable). Exercise instructors think they are ingenious in advocating that every 90 year ought to be running a marathon at least yearly as their prescription of a national health program -- while failing to acknowledge that most at that age, have a great difficulty just running to the bathroom, and the many more injuries and deaths that would produce -- until anybody with any sense, would point out that the reason everything hurts, is because of what one is doing.

Even the champion bodybuilders usually all have to eventually stop because they can no longer move their shoulders and hips, knees and elbows -- after years of excessive wear and tear -- even if the spirit is still willing. The flesh (reality) won't allow it anymore. But that is just exercise as they have known it all their lives -- which is certainly not the limits of the possibilities of movement and conditioning. In fact, far greater ranges of motion exist than they've ever tapped and thought to express, than the few they have learned and been conditioned to think are the only ways people can move -- which are not even the best ways people can move, as well as the most efficient way so that they might.

Instead, they are usually advised to try harder and longer, to do those things that are painful and unsuitable to do -- like marathon running or walking, for those who have difficulty just getting from one room to another. That kind of advice (instruction) is harmful as well as discouraging -- mainly because of the limitations of their instructor's own understanding of the virtually unlimited possibilities of movement -- of which those most commonly done, are obviously already the problem, and the cause of their poor condition and prognosis.

So in this particularly, and as a general principle of overcoming one's limitations and problems, the solution lies in re-examining the actual limits -- rather than simply the limits of conventional wisdom and conformity to the groupthink of mass media -- including the schools. That, probably, is the great failing of most schools -- promoting their way of thinking about anything, as the only way it can ever be thought -- which is usually the source of the problem, mistaking the problem for its solution -- and thinking that what is needed, is more of the same. And of course because it doesn't work, they're just admonished to try harder -- until they give up entirely, or have battered themselves into submission, somnolence or depression (dementias). They just don't care anymore, and if they did, they don't let on that they do. They effectively stop relating, reacting and responding to the world in an immediate and appropriate way -- especially at the sites in which the greatest range of expression are possible -- at the head (face), hands and feet.

Thus the markers of diminishing health are usually measured at the hands (grip strength), feet (balance), and range of expression at the face and movement of the head effected by the neck muscles that are a telltale sign of liveliness (animation) and blood flow to the brain, as well as the ability to withstand a blow to this critical area. Obviously the health and appearance of these areas, imply the general health and condition of the body -- way before one takes any lab tests confirming this impression. There is a reason people look healthy -- and not in spite of it. This is the rule and not the exception or randomness the "experts" claim only they can divine beyond.

This is a source of great pride for those who claim attributes not apparent and obvious to everyone else. Such people inhabit "opposite world," in which everything is the opposite of what it obviously seems -- and only the clever can see that. They alone, will "beat the market," "defy the odds," "ignore the obvious," etc., proud in their knowledge that all phenomenon is random activity, signifying nothing. And the height of their skill, is to convince all the others in the mass hysteria (media) that is so -- as proof of their power to convince everyone of what is not true -- as the highest achievement of human intelligence.

The rest they dismiss as "anecdotal," because they are based on one's actual experiences instead of what everyone should believe to be true -- as though anybody knew that with certainty. The best one can do is find out for themselves whether any claim is true, and not merely accept it because a proclaimed expert (spokesperson) says so -- and we ought to believe it no matter how absurd it seems, because they were certified and anointed by all the politically correct organizations -- whose sole purpose, is to confirm their own authority and authenticity -- and not allowing it to any others.

Fortunately, the world of rigid social/political/economic hierarchies are disintegrating as we speak, allowing in their wake, a greater freedom of expression than the very narrow channels of expression and possibilities. People who can no longer walk, or to whom it is a great difficulty, have even greater ways of increasing their mobility -- and range of travel, without having to first be disabled to impel them to do so. Getting back to "normal," is not their prime motivation, as so many conditioning programs are based on. Nor should it matter even, to be the world champion at something with no usefulness beyond the title -- at one point in their lives before losing all those faculties. What matters, is to be at the top of their game, no matter what condition and circumstances they now face.

And why shouldn't that be all one's life? -- for one's life? The real failing of the human condition, is the inability to express and communicate -- even in their own self-isolating activity. Like the bicyclist or runner pursuing the exclusion of all else but their own heart beat is surely someone ensuring that their survival is not long -- as one whose conditioning is a heightened awareness of everything going on around them -- and becoming one with it, rather than against and oblivious to everything else. Surely that optimizes one's survival -- which is really what fitness is all about, to live a better life and not extinguish prematurely, senselessly and needlessly.

Yes, he could have had lights on his bike -- and yielded to that logging truck instead of demanding his right of way -- as the ultimate test of wills. The skills implied in surviving, is the measure of that fitness.