An inspiring life is realized through training.
In its deepest form, training is a process of tuning in with ourselves and with nature. As we train, we find and become the savagely strong people we were meant to be. Our training prepares our bodies, minds, and spirits to engage more deeply with nature’s forces as we shed our culture’s weakness and open ourselves to greater truth, freedom, and strength.
Training is designed to push us into discomfort in appropriate dosages. If we avoid discomfort we don’t progress. If we push ourselves there too far and too much we overstress ourselves and we start to break down. In training we learn and refine this balance for ourselves. We all have a different balance and tolerance for discomfort, which changes in response to training and as a natural part of aging.
Optimizing training requires constant listening. We all respond differently to the many methods of training that exist. So long as we listen to this feedback, the differences in our responses are guides that help us realize our own unique way and our greatest strengths. Training becomes a grind when we are training to be someone other than who we truly meant to be or when we get caught in unhealthy fixations of our mind. Training results in injury when we fail to listen to our bodies’ needs, train in unnatural movement patterns, or train in pursuit of unbalanced outcomes. When we optimize our training we start to uncover our powerful primal selves. They might not look and perform specifically how we wanted them to look and perform when we started our training but they are almost certainly far more capable at embodying our inspirations and they are incredibly strong.
Training helps us clarify our life visions and our identities so that we can better focus our energy. Inspirations shape into a powerful visions as we work towards them every day. Each time we train we reinforce the truth that we are the people of our visions. External outcomes may or may not happen quite the way we desire but either way we are who we are meant to be.
Training teaches us to balance our minds, which is the most important skill for realizing whatever it is that we are training for. Training gives us daily lessons that hold struggle and fulfillment in balance. Befriending pain, fear, and struggle prepares us to face all challenges standing in the way of our inspiration. In this inescapable balance we find our fullness and learn to love every moment.
Training is equally a process of untraining. Just as muscles are rebuilt stronger after we damage them with heavy weights, all forms of training involve destructive elements. We walk this earth bound by limitations that we look for ways to break and filled with lies that we intuitively seek to unlearn. We untrain fear so that the courage of nature rushes in, we untrain our desire for comfort to receive nature’s strength, and we untrain false beliefs as we receive nature’s truth.
Training is a patient discipline that involves much repetition as well as experimentation over time. Nature doesn’t generally provide a quick easy path to realizing our strengths. If we developed overnight we would be mayflies (which, with their 24 hour lifespans, are impressive in their own unique nonhuman way). We do occasionally experience dramatic breakthroughs, but these come when we are ready. Every experience offers a lesson, but isolated retreats, occasional easy adventures, sporadic workouts, quick and easy lifehacks, or some cups of buttered coffee cannot bring us to whatever we truly seek to realize in ourselves.
Patience isn’t generally appreciated in our culture and it’s a message that doesn’t sell well on magazine covers. However, the belief that it is better to get everything faster is just a lie encouraged by an impatient and unsatisfied culture. Patience is one of training’s truths and that’s a healthy thing. Having a steady discipline aimed towards our inspirations helps us avoid feelings of emptiness and chaos. What really matters is that every moment of training is beautiful. It has to be... because training is life.
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