The great challenge of life in these times, as it always has been , is breaking free of the constraints of old, imperfect ideas of what life and reality is, and discovering what it truly is - without all the preconceived notions of what it is, perpetuated by the vested interests and their willing, unwitting accomplices. Many sources of information think that to be authoritarian is to be authoritative and nowhere is this more evident than in physical education instruction, where it is very easy to cross the line from helpfulness to abuse and exploitation. Even the most casual participants are often advised to work through the pain and discomfort instead of more logically finding the flow of least resistance.
The cult of great effort and struggle is a rather recent development and has not always been regarded as a great virtue. At the beginning of the 20th-Century, most of those who participated in the Olympic Games were people of the leisure class, for whom rigorous training and too great a desire for victory, was regarded as boorish behavior. While winning was a distinction, even more greatly esteemed was that one's conduct reflect the effortlessness in that achievement and one's good sportsmanship - qualities unfortunately lost in many of today's competitions and discussions. One was graceful and gracious in victory as well as defeat - and that is what made the champion. The game was irrelevant. People recognized who the great champions were - the people you wanted on your side if the fate of mankind hung in the balance. For only then, one knew, those champions could be challenged to their best - because then it really mattered, and the chips were on the line. Lots of people do well when it is only a game played a thousand times before. Fewer rise to the occasion when it is a game never played before, and the rules have to be discovered - from moment to moment, which is the creative life, exercising freedom. Such a life is conditioned, just as others condition themselves for a life of unrelenting, mechanical repetition, in a treadmill existence. What kind of life are you conditioning yourself for? -- greater freedom or a greater struggle?
One can design movement, play, work - just about any way one wants to - if one simply wants to, and is not bound to meet other demands and limits, real or imagined. Most of the time, the constraints placed on the way we do things is simply that they've "always been done that way," regardless of whether they make any sense at all, and often because they so violate our sensibilities that it is beyond the realm of rational thought. Most conventional notions of conditioning fall into this category of "opposite-thinking." That is, if something is simple and makes great sense, "we need to do the opposite," and then the universe will compensate us to restore the proper balance. If the movement is difficult for most, then we need to raise the bar and make it impossible for anyone - that's progress.
The radically different approach of 21st-Century conditioning is to reveal what are the simplest, most efficient and naturally powerful movements the body can make so that anyone can do them, in any condition in their lives, under any circumstances, with the greatest health-producing effects. Strangely, we've never thought that way before with regard to conditioning and exercise. We've always tried to make it harder and never easier - and ultimately effortless. A superior understanding renders all tasks to effortlessness. Why carry water downhill?
The well-conditioned mind of the conventional school is likely to answer, "To burn more calories," as though that was a brilliant insight. Why would an efficient, highly-functioning person ever simply want to burn more calories? The highly-efficient life-form conserves its energy and resources for optimal payoffs. The dysfunctional, chronically out-of-condition, confused, wasteful person thinks that the object of any activity is "simply to burn more calories (or time)," and doesn't recognize the more productive strategy is to expend the fewest (consume the fewest resources) - which requires the body to be in optimal condition! Form follows function: that which does, looks like it does. A fan looks like a fan - and not a refrigerator. A person whose major function in life is to keep a chair warm, of course thinks that the object of every activity is to burn more calories - because that's all he does, effectively. His orientation is expenditure and consumption rather than productivity and purpose.
This kind of conditioning program is useless, wasteful by its very conception and design. Even the most sedentary person doesn't need to do more; he only needs to do what he already does -- better. It's because of the way they sleep, sit, walk, and breathe that is the reason they are badly conditioned and not because they aren't doing some other things that lots of other people also don't do and aren't similarly deficient. That is the scam. Lots of people are in great shape without doing fitness activities. They know how to move - quite naturally. People don't move awkwardly because they're in poor condition; they're in poor condition because they move awkwardly, wastefully, inefficiently - and the body's form reveals that as well as the movement itself. They don't need to do more repetitions of awkward movements but have to learn to move gracefully and effortlessly in whatever they're doing. It's quality and not quantity that differentiates. When that is understood, a transformation is effected immediately.
Those who cannot make changes - have become accustomed to lives of unvarying sameness, paralyzed by their familiarity with bureaucracies and rewards by seniority rather than merit - have great difficulty with these concepts. For them, the world is unresponsive, arbitrary, and it takes ages if ever, for any change to be proposed, much less adopted and then implemented. Fortunately, that is the plight of ever-decreasing numbers because society cannot support an ever-increasing number of drones relative to the productive part of the population. Somewhere down the production line, somebody has to produce, and everybody can't just be faking it, going through the motions, saying one thing and doing something else, or having no idea and awareness of what one is doing but not drawing any attention because everybody else is doing the same. In such an environment, the productive individual may be ostracized for making everybody else "look bad" - though that is not his intention; rather, such individuals are unconcerned about anybody else's business because they are properly focused on their own. These few are self-directed rather than other-directed, or moved by peer-pressure and the need to conform. These former are the 21st-Century personalities just as the 20th-Century was dominated by the authoritarian, demagogic personalities requiring conformance and obedience to increasingly outrageous demands.
So the conditioning required to thrive in the 21st-Century of unlimited options are very different than the world in which conformity to a predetermined, externally-imposed set of values define "fit." That was fitness according to how well one "fit" into whatever regimentation a self-selected group of individuals felt maximized their advantage relative to the rest. The problem with "exclusive" societies is that eventually their process of selection leaves the brains and talent on the "other side," and so at the eventual Showdown at the OK Corral, they realize they've loaded all their guns with blanks, and anyway, the guns only look like they work because they came off the production line where everybody's perceived job was to do less than everybody else, while getting the same , or even, more pay. To do anything else would be discrimination - and discrimination of any kind, was not allowed. To be prejudiced is one thing and to discriminate is something else entirely, but "discriminate" became the euphemism for "prejudice," and when one was not allowed to discriminate that difference or anything else for that matter, mischief and chaos could have a field day that we are only now recovering from. Those were the Dark Ages of these modern times - whose grip was quickly broken because it led to the advent of all the media that leveled the media control of the 19th and 20th centuries -- distinctly broadcast, or one-way communications. They dictated - and there was no way for the other side to have their story presented - unedited and unbiased. Of course "they" thought they had all the brains and talent on their side - and so were the final say on what was real and what went unreported. By their narrow selective process, it came to be that the mass of relevant news went unreported while trivial gossip, was "the news."
But the truth keeps on popping up - like icebergs in a sea of untruths. Slowly, the captain of the Titanic makes his way to the lifeboats so as not to alarm any of the passengers. And that is what we're seeing as we approach the new millennium - those realizing they're conditioning themselves for a life in the past, for the wrong century, while still being assured that they're on the right boat, that nothing can go wrong, all the experts are already on board.
A solution for a problem works most of the time - under most normal circumstances. Solutions that don't work, usually have a lot of explanations why it failed this one time, and then a whole different set of explanations why it failed again, and again. One might be encouraged to continue with a solution for several weeks or months before noticing any differences; in the meantime, the estimate for the cost of the solution might have risen out of control, and since we've made a commitment, we'd lose our investment if we change course now hoping for a better result. Results, we are told, come eventually - when we have long-forgotten why we persist in the ways we do. We may be advised to replace bad habits with good habits - rather than realizing that all habitual behaviors may be the problem. In this way, one comes to accept the language of the problem as though it could ever produce a solution. Habitual behavior never responds to the inputs of the present challenge but is a knee-jerk response to all situations without discrimination.
I'm always amazed to hear from a person who performs a brutally hard physical job that they lack the energy for three-weekly, two-hour workouts - like everybody else (they think is doing). They are astonished by the suggestion that they might require less rather than more activity, and sure enough, when they increase their rest and recuperation time, they feel more energetic and notice positive changes in their health and well-being. The appropriate choice of complementary activity for such people would be activities that produce as little additional demands on the physical reserves (recovery ability) as necessary, rather than the line of opposite-thinking reflexly offered by the exercise professionals - that more will increase one's capacity and tolerance infinitely. That's not how any organism (or machine) is designed. In fact, time and experience weeds out those who do not learn the lesson that results must come with as little risk and expense as possible - and these few words, require the highest degree of discrimination. The discriminating person, is not a creature of habit - but because of well-made distinctions, evolves to make even more challenging ones.
Most great discoveries are not made in government-funded research projects. In fact, few, if any, monumental discoveries have come about that way. A great idea cannot be grasped by a petty bureaucrat - who will insist that he understand the solution before he will fund the problem. Realizing this, many well-intentioned people go along, thinking it is merely a temporary detour: they inevitably get caught in the bureaucratic maze and spend the rest of their lives trying to extricate themselves - but most will just give up and become the next petty bureaucrat. Fortunately, the most talented will not be successful at playing the game (which is not to say that every unsuccessful person is talented - at this or any other game). There are those who will "fail" at a game because they are playing a far more interesting and challenging one, while there are the unfortunate many whose ambition is not justified by their talent. Ambition will only take them so far because when they get to the Olympics of today's recruitment, they're shocked by the realization that anybody competing on that level of selection is a genetic mutation designed for that particular activity - and one can't simply will his way to be the best. One might as well bet on the elephant to beat the cheetah - one of these days.
Conditioning for the 21st-Century is jumping to these higher levels of awareness and understanding - of the relationship of everything to everything else. Reality is more than one person's idea or explanation of what is happening - hoping to dominate every other. Good ideas stand the test of time, but even they, are not the whole of reality. Reality is the truth every one discovers for himself whether he is published or not, becomes rich and famous for it or not. Reality is the game we all play - with different abilities, different outcomes, different meanings. So never before was it more necessary to "know oneself" - meaning one's unique talents, weaknesses, dispositions, preferences, etc., because we weren't all created the same, with only different Social Security numbers to differentiate us. The non-discrimination advocates want this regard of individuals as a faceless, indistinct , indistinguishable, random blob, where nothing really matters. In such an environment, even protozoa and amoebas languish.
Whenever discernment moves to a higher criteria, it is frequently thought that all discriminations are being abandoned simply because the old distinctions are being ignored - that what was formerly thought to be the critical difference is now regarded as an insignificant one. It happens in science and technology all the time; there is progress because knowledge is constantly refined, and when there is a major breakthrough in understanding, that magnitude is called the quantum leap, because one can no longer predict the future course by its past trajectory. The breakthrough in the fitness field is this shift in emphasis from effort to understanding - that a higher level of understanding and awareness of what one is doing is much more productive than simply more effort with little or no understanding, as though a breakthrough is possible through the miracle of brute force. We no longer live in that kind of world. With rare exceptions, the television or computer doesn't work better because we give it a few good slaps on the side - yet that is the approach still being used in most conventional conditioning programs.
The poor condition of the general population is not due to the failure of individuals to adhere to the program as it is that the program does not work for most and so they abandon their efforts, which any intelligent person would. At its best, I would hardly call a fitness program a success if all it ever did was qualify one to work out longer and harder while subtracting that time and energy from other enjoyable and productive activities. A conditioning program that makes great sense is one that enhances performance and productivity no matter what one is doing. Key to human functioning is respiration and circulation - particularly to the critical organ of the human body, which is the brain -- that regulates every other function, including the heart. Ironically for many to believe, is that the greatest factor limiting muscular/physical growth is the development and optimal maintenance of the brain. All things being equal, the better the conditions under which the brain operates, the better all other systems of the human body will function. So what do we do to enhance the flow of blood and oxygen to the brain should be the movement of paramount consideration.
In a culture that likes to see things as a dichotomous struggle between one at the expense of another, the mind is pitted against the body, instead of regarding the mind as a function of the body and the body the function of the mind. It is not just a rhetorical trick but the actuality great energy goes to deny. With this integration of function and form, there is no struggle and no extraneous effort required. The mind is not working to dominate the body while the body enables the mind - it is that simple and easy. However, we pay a lot of money to people who tell us that everything is not simple and easy but complicated and complex, requiring armies of experts to see us safely through each day fraught with unimaginable perils, "If it could happen to one," they gleefully warn, "it could happen to all." Therefore , we all need to rush out this very minute and obtain ______ detectors "for total peace of mind."
We need to acknowledge that the consciousness of this time is permeated with marketing messages - even by our friendly non-profit organizations as well as the various overt trade associations. Just about every group thinks that to obtain their fair share, they have to make a grab for the entire pot - since that's what everybody else is doing - they rationalize. Of course, such thinking limits them to the consolation bracket because the really big prizes cannot be owned exclusively - they are for everybody, to be enjoyed to the extent that one has cultivated their capacity to appreciate. The swine will always demand more pearls upon which to trample.
But that is the shift one recognizes increasingly moving into the 21st-Century - that with the same resources, some create worlds that have never existed before, while others ask, "What have you done for me lately?" - as though entitled but not required to make any contribution to the supply themselves. That is the crippling mindset of dependency - particularly that of letting somebody do our thinking for us, in the many ways we each are capable of doing for ourselves. Many people's totality of "knowledge" consists of what somebody else has told them is true - instead of discovering the truth for themselves through their own experiences. Many self-aggrandizing organizations insist that nothing can be true unless they say it is true, as though they were the sole arbiters of truth on this planet. And the first of their truths is that they above all others, need to be compensated more than everybody else for the great sacrifices they are making for the sake of truth. Their second great truth is that individual experience is invalid and "anecdotal" because it was not discovered under laboratory conditions - which they confuse for the real world. The laboratory condition always presumes that all the variables are known - while the process of discovery considers that the known may in fact be the unknown - and that is the problem. That is, the premise nobody questions, is the reason things don't work out as we'd like them to - and so more effort just leads to frustration and hopelessness.
The myth perpetuated by those in the bodybuilding world is that bodybuilders always look the way they do in a physique contest - when in fact, these individuals are noteworthy for the fact that they have the ability to transform themselves the most. The differences between untransformed physiques is not as great as they are after they transform themselves (by pumping up). In many instances, one cannot tell the physique competitor from most other muscular athletes. The peculiarity of the bodybuilding competitor is this ability to transform himself beyond the appearance required for any other competitive activity. And why is this observation so important? Because the average person has this ability to transform his physical appearance instantaneously also to a profound extent - if he simply learns how. With this skill (learned), many people who look obviously out-of-shape, would just look normal, as though they were in good shape, and for most practical purposes, would be considered so both by others as well as their own self-perception. The musculature is obviously there: out-of-shape people don't know how to use their muscles to look in-shape. And when a person does learn how to look in-shape, then he possesses the muscular control to actually be in shape.
Being "fit" after all, is optimally using what one has - as he is in the present moment, and not some mythical state of perfection one is constantly striving for in some distant, never-to-be attained future. The place is here, the time is now - for doing one's best; that's the simplicity of life. One can complicate life immeasurably and needlessly, concoct all manner of theories and conspiracies, and at the end of the day, the sun will set - and the smart money will be on the probability that it will rise again in the morning. Everything else will have to be improvised -- and so far, so good. There are no guarantees, but we're willing to take the risk - of thinking for ourselves and finding out the truth of our own experience. Do we need experts for this or is each necessarily his own virtual expert? It is the Age of Individuality that we are conditioning ourselves for. Everyone will have all the tools and all the information - if he simply wants it. Not all will. Many have come to prefer having "the experts" do all their thinking for them and that was never intended by the great thinkers of any time; they invariably wanted to share their joy of discovery.
The Cult of Experts is dead. A critical mass has been liberated and connected. The world will never be the same, though some will still insist that history only repeats itself, like people perfecting the treadmill. It seems that way for a while and then a quantum leap, and another - leading to a greater simplicity. That is the direction of a greater understanding - always leading to a greater simplicity and integration of experience, and not the fragmentation leading to more experts required to explain all the things as though they're unrelated to everything else. What'll we do without all the problems created by the self-appointed experts? We find out: all we're risking is the fear, and when that's lost, that is the gain.
The 21st-Century Individual is conditioned and prepared for anything, is a completely-developed personality, processes any piece of data like any other because he has the tools for it and the barriers that have restricted access to information in the past have been obliterated. The brains and talent are on the outside. That may be the most empowering realization of this time. The people on the inside are trapped - in the 20th-Century lives of the assembly-line, hard-work, unending struggle and striving, hoping to get somewhere, be somebody - while ignoring what was already there, and making the most of it. We've never been conditioned to think that way - everybody thinking - as though it was alright to do so, and changing without having to consult some authority's opinion and permission. Isn't that what freedom is all about?