Invictus

Another poem before I go out for my long run this morning. (10 miler) This time, it's William Ernest Henley and this is one of my favorites.

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of Circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of Chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

Crucible

Some morning thoughts as I'm about to go do my hill sprints (Thanks for reading, Charles!):

Safety is the enemy of progress. How will a ship find the other shore when it never leaves the first one? Do not be safe, do not long for stability. Accept the danger, the thrill and exhilaration of the fact that you may very well die in this endeavor, that you may fail and that there may be disaster. If death and disaster come, smile and endure. Smile because you attempted something worth attempting and endure because you are a man, a cosmic being.

There is salvation only in extremes. Jesus was a lot of things but he was not well-adjusted, upper middle class with a safe and secure environment from where his emotionally-balanced approach to life helped him to actualize himself. No, Jesus was man perfected. His mission was to live perfectly, yet endure hatred from insects, vermin and rabble and die at their filthy hands. He went through with it. Mission accomplished.

My mission is to be Jesus-like. You may also read that as "God-like" if you wish. A man that protects, like he did when he confronted the power of the Pharisees and protected the woman caught in adultery, a man who provides, and a man who fights as he did in the temple driving out the moneychangers. Perhaps it may simply be my own eisegetical perspective but I cannot help but read Jesus as a hot-blooded, passsionate man. I reject any view of him that makes him a serene, mountaintop yogi castrado. No, he is not soft. As C.S. Lewis said of Aslan, "He is not a tame lion." He's not a safe lion. But he's a good lion.

Salvation only in extremes. My rebellion is against the seething cesspool of mediocrity that we call 21st century America. Salvation in extremes. What are people doing with their lives? They pour their (very-marginal) efforts into trying to secure as much safety and security for their futures as they can. They want to entertain themselves into oblivion. No, NO,

HELL NO.

Plunge myself into danger, discomfort. Throw myself into an unknown, stressful environment. Feel the fear, feel it course through your veins. The heart pounds faster, the head spins, non-vital functions shut off. You know why people who are terrified pee uncontrollably? It's because the body doesn't need to hold urine now. It's moving all the blood to the heart and muscles so that you can fight off a wolf or run away from a bear. Let my soul do the same. Jettison the useless portions. Move blood, fire, peauvoir to the vital areas.

A soft bed to come home to? Do not need.
Softball every Sunday? Do not need.
Stable, quiet job where I can be left alone? Do not need.
World's finest cuisine in a 20-minute radius? Do not need.
Contact with friends and family? Do not need.

And let me shock you now:
Watching my favorite team in their beautiful new stadium? Do. Not. Need.

What do I need?

A spiritual crucible.

Raw material, freshly ripped from the earth's womb is thrown in and a masterpiece emerges. Hard. Cold. Strong and beautiful as steel. Something to make man ashamed of their existence.

You only see what a man is like when you push him beyond his abilities; when you break him. Will I be the man that I hope I'll be? Will I be a quivering coward running back to his mother's skirt? Talk is cheap. We will see how much my soul is worth.

I will leave this country in less than a year. I will not come back soon.

Thank you, Jack

Link

More today than yesterday.
More tomorrow than today.

Keep on trucking.

No Coward Soul Is Mine

Ah, how did I come across this again? Emily, you were always my favorite.

No coward soul is mine,
No trembler in the worlds storm-troubled sphere:
I see Heavens glories shine,
And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

O God within my breast.
Almighty, ever-present Deity!
Life -- that in me has rest,
As I -- Undying Life -- have power in Thee!

Vain are the thousand creeds
That move mens hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as withered weeds,
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by Thine infinity;
So surely anchored on
The steadfast Rock of immortality.

With wide-embracing love
Thy Spirit animates eternal years,
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou wert left alone,
Every existence would exist in Thee.

There is not room for Death,
Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou -- Thou art Being and Breath,
And what Thou art may never be destroyed.

The Reality Bath

All I really know about this title is that Mark Twight used it in his book "Kiss or Kill" and that it's the name of, if I recall correctly, a frozen waterfall.

That's beautiful.

I think waterfalls are awesome places of power, fury and constancy. I loved visiting Niagra with Peter and some Buffalo people a few years ago. I wish they didn't have those ridiculous lights turning the waterfall, pink, green, blue, purple, chartreuse. Instead, I would've loved to be on a very small boat or skiff at the basin, full moon turning those million gallons of rushing water into beautiful mirrors. I wish I could be in my small sliver of wood or tin, deafened by Niagra's fury. I am on a quest to forge my body into its most perfect form, lean, powerful, strong, enduring. But no matter what heights I achieve, I will never compare to these cataracts. Awesome. AWESOME! I want to float tremulously in that small boat, shouting and laughing. What amazing power!

Now imagine it frozen. Stark, perfect beauty. I picture it in my mind's eye. The lines, the movement, the suggestion of speed, the suggestion of power, the form of fury and expressed in the cold, statuesque elegance of ice.

Beautiful.

I remember in Twight's essay, how as he climbed that waterfall alone, he thought how suited this name was for the waterfall. Reality Bath. If you had any delusions about your beauty, they were stripped away when you climbed this high-grade mountain of slick, ice. Winds whipping around you, flaying you alive as they find their way through every crevice of clothing, hands numb from gripping onto nothing but ice and steel. As you look down, I suppose, you can only imagine what it must be like to fall hundreds of feet onto the hard, unforgiving ice. I wonder if anyone will have the courage to imagine their skull being sundered in an explosion of blood. The reality bath.

The reality bath.

I imagine the reality bath is going to be the very opposite of a bubble bath. Not warm. But freezing. Not comforting. But agonizing. I imagine it to be like a full body immersion in freezing acid. First the nerves and system are shocked. Then everything dissolves, layer by layer. The deceptions that we wrap ourselves in, the comfortable things we say to ourselves to repair and shield our egos from the terrible TRUTH, these things are dissolved. And each shell of lies comes off painfully until even the very structure of our lives, the bones, are nothing more than dust and scum on the surface.

The reality bath.

The truth is rarely going to be pleasant, particularly when it is about who we are. But like Twight and Bruce Lee, men who I admire in many respects, it is about progress and it is about becoming who we are and finding who we were that we take these reality baths. It is about the reality of our very existence.

Don't be afraid of pain.

Psalm 46

To the Choirmaster.
Of the Sons of Korah.
According to Alamoth.

A song.

God is our refuge and strength
a very present help in trouble.

Therefore we will not fear though
the earth give way,
though the mountains be moved into
the heart of the sea
though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble
at its swelling. Selah

There is a river whose streams
make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most
High.

God is in the midst of her; she
shall not be moved.
God will help her when
morning dawns.

The nations rage, the kingdoms
totter;
he utters his voice, the earth
melts.

The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our
fortress. Selah

Come, behold the works of the
Lord,
how he has brought desolations on the earth.

He makes the wars cease to the end of
the earth;
he breaks the bow and shatters
the spear;
he burns the chariots with fire.

Be still, and know that I am God.

I will be exalted among the nations.
I will be exalted in the earth!

The Lord of hosts is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.

Selah

Progress

"I just can't go heavy."

You can always get medium sets of medium reps with medium weights. It's like what Socrates tells Dan Millman; basically, this is like lukewarm tea, "the Devil's brew!" Medium is the death song for training. You can train medium (also known as "crappy") for years and years while making no progress. Let's be honest, go find average in everything. Buy the damn pale green, four-door Ford Escort of your dreams and go wave at hot babes. Get all C's and then ask your counselor, "What's my skill set?"

In other words, training a lot at lousy is still lousy. If you "can't go heavy," back off until you can!

From Dan John in this article.