One of Those Big Aha Moments: Apparently, a Fit Body Doesn’t = Extreme Willpower
OK, so a little background first…over the years of my practice I had repetitively returned to one of those crazy pervasive wrong views that I just couldn’t shake: A fit body = extreme willpower.
Of course, I knew it was a wrong view, that it was permanent; I had done countless exercises gathering evidence of all the times a fit body doesn’t equal extreme willpower (how easy was it to be fit without trying in my teens, how much more did I will it and work for it only to be less fitter in my 40s; many slaves working in fields had fit bodies, did their fitness really reflect extreme willpower or just being forced to do what it took to survive; what about folks who get all sorts of skinny when they have cancer, its not willpower over their diet that got them there; etc.). Still though, on some level it seemed ‘obvious’ to me that when I was at my fittest, from strict diet and 4 hours a day of exercise, my crazy ripped body was a physical reflection of the willpower it took, to do the shit it took, to achieve that state. Like boiling water reflects a temperature over 212 degrees, my fittest self reflected my extreme willpower. No matter how much evidence my brain gathered to the contrary, my little heart just couldn’t believe it, the ‘truth’ ripped body=extreme willpower was so damn ‘obvious’ to me.
So, fast forward to a day in late 2020…a friend of mine had been messaging me for advice on some issues she was having at work. She was stressed by the consequences of some difficulty she was having managing her subordinates, and then doubly stressed by the self hate she felt for being “bad boss”. I had known this friend for a while and as I listened to her story I realized that the details of her struggles change by the instance –today it is a work problem, a few weeks ago a friend issue, before that a fight with her mom — but this friend has a single wrong view, a way she sees herself and her place in the world, that underlies every story. To me, the view was so friggin’ clear, but she was blind to the pattern in her own life despite her efforts to see it.
After we ended our talk, I was left with the deep reminder of just how pervasive our views are, how totally blind to them we could be. I also understood that though my friend may hate herself, feel herself to be an innately bad, bad, bad person (this was part of her more pervasive wrong view), her actions were born of her view; as long as she holds that view she can’t really be expected to act any differently. Once the view is rectified though the behaviors can change, she is not as innately bad, bad, bad as she believes.
OK, I know, we are on a bit of a journey here, but fast forward again to a few days after my conversation with my friend…I read in the newspaper that the Black Panther actor, Chadwick Boseman, had died, at just 43, of colon cancer. The news hit me really hard. Its not just that Boseman had been so young, or that his death seemed so sudden, its that the dude was supremely fit. I had just finished a Marvel movie marathon and in Black Panther, filmed just a few years before, he was super ripped. And super ripped is supposed to = extreme willpower right? Only dying, decaying, having cancer consume your body (at the height of your fame no less) seems like the total failure of willpower, an ultimate loss of control. This time, the evidence didn’t just register in my head, it hit my heart.
On the tail of my conversation with my friend — when I saw just how oblivious we can be to our own wrong views and when, seeing her, it was so damn clear how all our actions inevitably arise from those views, I decided to rethink my long-held-stubborn-stuck notions about fitness and willpower. That is when it dawned on me: All that my own peak fit body reflected was my BELIEF that a fit body equals extreme willpower, and the extreme value I place on identifying with that willpower, which I literally tried to embody. I value extreme willpower so highly, and I was so blindly convinced I could demonstrate it though the rigorous discipline of my body, that I spent tons of time and energy, and endured crazy deprivation and labor, on my fitness regimen. The reality though was all that my fit body really reflected/demonstrated was the depths of my delusional beliefs. A form I took such pride in, because of what I believed it reflected, really just laid my own ignorance plain and bare for all to see.
I was so convinced that my own fit body represented the willpower it took to do the extreme shit that I did to be so fit, I had come to think of it as causative the way a certain temperature causes water to boil. If you see water boiling you know heat happened, just so if you see ripped alana, you know willpower happened. But in truth, if you see ripped alana, all you know are that the causes and conditions for a particular physical form to take shape must have occurred. The delusion that there was more/different meaning in a particular physical shape may have motivated my behaviors (behaviors btw that were painful and stressful), but it didn’t make it true.
Here is perhaps a simpler example: A guy has found a treasure map, he wants the treasure so bad he spends his life, his time and resources, hunting for the treasure. But if you watch him scramble to try and find the treasure, it should be clear that all his efforts are not evidence that there really is a buried treasure out there, its just evidence that he believes it enough, and wants the treasure enough, to jump through all the hoops to uncover it. Of course, the longer this guy tries to find the treasure, the more work he puts in, the more ‘clues’ he interprets to mean he is on the right track, the more convinced he becomes the treasure is really there. We all allow our actions, born of ignorance, to further our own wild beliefs.
I too had used circular logic to further feed my delusions: I believed fitness proved willpower, and I willed myself to do the work it took to be fit, so in my mind I used the state of fitness I had achieved to reinforce my belief that fit=willpower. Example again to show my craziness: Pretend I believed that if a tree grows there must be a tree spirit feeding it, I see a grown tree, so I take it as evidence of a tree spirit.
When I plug in treasure hunting and tree nymphs, the absurdity of my belief is so clear. When I watch my friend struggle with the same views, causing the same behaviors and the sameish conflicts over and over, it is so clear. But my own belief is so tight, I am so blind, I don’t see the circularity at all.
And now Dear Reader, we fast forward again, to Dec 2022, when I am writing this blog, admitting to you that I am guilty here of conflating my understanding back in 2020 — which was really just a rather rudimentary seeing that my own peak fit body reflected was my BELIEF that a fit body equals extreme willpower, and the extreme value I place on that characteristic of willpower — and the much deeper/richer/clearer understanding that you see here in this blog, refined by more years of practice. I didn’t realize at the time, but this particular insight ended-up being a real aha moment; it has become a cornerstone I return to when I need a concrete reminder –something I really understood — to use as a parallel when my contemplations move on to shakier ground. With this particular insight, I came to see more clearly the ways I trick myself, the pervasiveness of my delusions and the need to question and re-question the beliefs I have, the tautologies I create in my mind, that exist no where else in the world.
