Fitness Isn’t Rocket Science. But It Will Take You to The Moon
Landing men on the moon is complicated. Getting fit is not.
Fitness is one of those rare birds that’s easy to understand but difficult to execute. We know what needs to be done. We know what levers to pull. But getting started? Doing the work? Staying consistent? These are some of life’s toughest challenges.
In 1962 John F. Kennedy said, “We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”
Choose to become fit. Not because it is easy, but because it is hard.
I’ve talked about doing hard things before. I believe doing hard things is the cure for an uninspired life. Doing hard things snaps you out of comfortably numb oblivion and onto a higher plane of existence.
We’re descendents of hunters. Of men who pursued great wooly beasts while fighting off all manner of tigers and monsters. Survival wasn’t guaranteed, or even likely. Hardship anchored the human spirit.
Fitness allows us to tap into our genetic history. To embody the character and courage of our ancestors. To bring out our strength and resilience that has been locked away. That for too long has been ignored, repressed and circumvented. And for what? DoorDash?
Wake up early for spin class. Stay late to finish your weight training. Don’t stop at mile four of a five mile run. Approach your fitness like you would your lover — with vigor, intensity and healthy respect.
Fitness is earned, not given. And the price is blood, sweat and tears.
Then, when enough tears have been shed, when enough blood coats your hands, when enough sweat soaks you through to the bone, you’ll understand. You’ll see what all your hard work was about. You’ll look at yourself in the mirror one morning and think, “That’s fucking right.”
Fitness isn’t rocket science. It’s not difficult to understand what to do and when. But if you commit, really commit, if you do it right, if you do it to the best of your ability, you’ll fly higher than you ever have before.
And you’ll wave to the moon as you go soaring by.