The Significance of Blogging (Writing)

As people get older, an obvious problem is their physical decline and deterioration, greatly from the wear and tear over a long life, and particularly so, for those formerly involved in very rigorous and injurious activities -- including the constant pain many inflict on themselves -- because they've been brainwashed into believing that it is "good for them," even when it causes them injury, harm and pain.

But even less obvious, is the deterioration of the brain from its improper use, and more likely, lack of use -- because it is no longer challenged to grow as it was encouraged, if not forced to do as an impressionable young person.  At retirement, nobody seems to care anymore, what one does -- and therefore, every individual has to take that primary responsibility for themselves!  That is a shocking thing for a lot of people -- and the major reason many at retirement, immediately go into irreversible and irrevocable decline -- because they haven't cultivated any regimen or strategy for replacing that void that the external institutions and persons played in their lives -- and so they are truly lost, with no idea of how to resuscitate and resurrect themselves.

The major reason for blogging is not that it will (might) get read, but it will be surely written by the person doing so -- as the most powerful act of maintaining and expanding their mental capabilities, and if not read in their lifetime, still has a chance of being eventually discovered when the time is right for that realization.  Throughout history, most of the great inventive minds, were not realized until after their time on earth -- which often drove them to an early death -- in being greatly misunderstood and even persecuted for it.  The classics are Jesus, Socrates, Galileo, Paracelsus, Mendel, and just about anybody who has been too far ahead of their time -- so that there was basically no peer group competent and qualified to judge them, thought they invariably did, with famously disastrous conclusions.

What is important, is that one is very clear to oneself, and works on refining that clarity -- as the unique meaning and purpose of their existence, which never ends until it ends, as the vehicle that requires them to be at their best -- even when nobody else can tell that difference.  What is supremely important, is that one themselves still can tell that difference -- and make that difference!

Blogging (writing) is what most people still can do -- even when it seems they can do very little else anymore -- but in keeping the brain (mind) functioning at its peak and expanding its range in this manner, the health and viability of the rest of the body, is given its greatest chance for maintaining and attaining its peak capacities.

But what should one blog (write) about? -- is a question that daunts and discourages many from taking up the pen (keyboard).  Obviously, that should be what one is the most knowledgeable, if not the best in the world at -- which for everybody, would be themselves -- and their own health and awareness, which for most of our lives, we've been discouraged to think has any validity and should be discarded -- in favor of the experts' opinions, and other vested interests who would like to do the thinking for everybody else.  All that they ask, is to be allowed to do so.

One has to be clear when that authority is given -- to supersede one's own judgments about these things -- that should know better, for themselves.  It might be such a simple thing as what foods they are allergic to -- and what things they seem to have an advantage in -- as their own unique profile of who they actually are, and not always, the way the experts and controllers demand that they must be -- in order to fit into their expectations of how everybody ought to be -- for their benefit, convenience and world view as the expedient truth, and not the actual specific in every case.

The generalization is not the reality -- even most times, because one doesn't know if one is generalizing about the right phenomenon -- or mistakes one thing for something else -- unless they first bother to learn of the specifics.  That is first and foremost, the work of the blogger (writer) -- and not just simply spouting off one generalization and cliche, as inappropriately and irrelevantly as possible -- as though that was enough to make the mind sharper, more penetrating, effective and powerful -- throughout their life, not as a competitive game, but as an exercise of the limits of their being.  That is far more meaningful than running farther and faster each day, until the limits of that endurance are exhausted and irrecoverable -- as the actual limits of those exercises.

But with the mind, there are no actual physical limits in this way -- but one's own frontiers of where it has not gone before -- and need to be explored and vitalized.  Such exercises increases the critical mass of the mind that drives the rest of the body -- that is the animating spirit beyond the muscles and flesh.

Many are reaching the point in life in which the physicality of their existence is still intact, but their mental capacities and connections have vanished -- and while they may live on in that way for years if not decades, healthy individuals would not choose to be in that hopeless deteriorating condition -- if it was at all possible to avoid.  For certainly, that would be a living death -- and beyond that, an interminable descent into pain, deterioration and debility, nature (life) never intended -- even if possible to prolong indefinitely.

The amount of resources required to prolong such existences, would drain away all the resources required to sustain the most healthy and viable -- which is the preservation of the species, which is the larger objective of all human meaning and purpose.  Thus, health should be prolonged as long as it is possible and viable -- while not being mistaken for death and dying as health, and a healthy way of living.  It is a matter of priorities and limited resources -- and the intelligent choices one has to make, to remain so.

The Sustainable Society

The key issue is sustainability. 

Obviously we can't pay people as much or more NOT to do a job -- all their lives, so that eventually all government does is pay a self-chosen few lifetime entitlements -- while the citizens no longer have any government functions and services -- which are now only a distant memory of why those few are entitled to everything while the rest of the citizens  just have to pay for it.

Even when the median of those pensions exceed the median of all the incomes, obviously, those NOT working, are being paid more than most of the "working" people -- which hardly seems fair to most impartial mediators -- except that the government mediators are usually vested in that same inequity, and of course want it to continue, and can see no wrong with that.

That is the history of all the civilizations that have risen and fallen -- because they weren't sustainable in that way.  That is due to the unfairness of that compensation system -- that maintains those inequalities until finally, they have to fall -- on the sheer weight that all the money in society cannot be diverted to the least productive segment simply demanding "more than the rest -- for life, with nothing in return."

An idea that makes these pensions sustainable as well as fair -- is to pay all retirees the same minimum pension, and not more to those who have always had more.  But beginning at age 65 -- everybody just receives the same basic retirement stipend, because the basic lifestyle must be maintained for all -- rather than continuing the injustice of the privileged continuing that advantage, as we see obviously in the government pensions, but to a lesser degree with Social Security -- which is much more equal in this respect.

In a sense, one is just guaranteeing everyone in society -- a base level of support, and assume that those who in their working lives made much more, have saved some in addition to enjoying a much more prosperous lifestyle -- which usually continues beyond their retirement, because they don't have to be acquiring and accumulating it at that point in their lives -- but actually should be beginning the process of downsizing and eventually divesting, and not just going to the grave at the high point of one's hoarding.

Then, essentially, one has the base for an indefinitely sustainable society -- rather than just a permanently entitled "nobility" claiming legality despite its gross unfairness and injustice, because they are the status quo and defenders of those institutions (inequities).

It Doesn't Take Much

People have been conditioned to think that the best way to make things easy, is to make them impossibly hard (and difficult), so that the actual doing of it, seems easy by comparison -- rather than to make things as ridiculously easy in the first place, so that it doesn't take much to do them at all.

This is particularly important in exercise -- as the tendency to find even the easiest things difficult in time, so that eventually, one no longer even attempts to do anything any more, because just the thought of doing it anymore, discourages them.

That is especially unfortunate for those who can no longer do very punishing workloads any longer -- because their bodies just can't take it anymore, and recover for the next.  So one of the key concepts in retaining this lifelong ability to keep on doing what one has been doing, is to actually discover ways to make it easier -- and not as many people erroneously do, make everything in life as hard, difficult and complicated, so that eventually, they just don't even try anymore -- or even think about it.

That is the conditioning we know as "aging" -- or finally reaching that point at which we just give up trying -- as perfectly acceptable and justifiable, because it is just too hard, difficult, and impossible anymore.  In exercise, we call that increasing the "resistance" or workload, until finally it crushes you, and then one has a perfectly good reason for not doing it anymore.  Your permanently crippled and disabled body is proof enough that you don't have to do anything anymore, but just let nature take its course to the ultimate end.

So it's really a mind-boggling, and earth-shaking proposition, to make exercise increasingly easier -- so that one can always do them -- with no excuses for not.  That's not what people want to hear -- who are conditioned to the excuses for not doing anything anymore.

All those movements that can be done with weights or on weight machines, can be done even more effectively, without weights (resistance) -- better and longer without them!  That's been known for a long time -- that the lighter the weight, the better the form in performing that movement -- and it is the movement itself that is important, and not any amount of weight or added resistance -- that makes that movement difficult and corrupted.

And as people age, doing the movement itself -- without any weight, is often difficult or impossible anymore -- and in most cases, even imaginable anymore.  Thus obviously, just being able to perform a movement as lifting one's arms overhead would be quite an achievement -- and doing that for 50 times, would be enough to retain and even improve that movement -- without danger of injury because no extra-ordinary resistance or load is imposed -- that simply adds to the risk of injury, while doing nothing to increase the benefit in perfecting that movement.  In short, the reward-risk ratio, begins at zero and proceeds to negative -- until there is only the certainty of injury, death or disability, and at that point, the wise person retires, or withdraws from further competition.

One simply recognizes their limits -- rather than taking it to the ultimate end.  There is no shame in that.  One should explore their abilities until they reach those limits -- and then move on to explore and develop other aspects of their potential in which they haven't reached those limits but still can double their gains daily.  And that obviously, would be in doing those things one hasn't done before -- so that in going from zero to even one, is a tremendous improvement, and then up to fifty (50), is most people's point of exhaustion -- in any movement, even without any resistance.

It doesn't have to be a particularly difficult movement to begin with -- but in doing it for 50 times, will require one to develop a proficiency and efficiency of that movement, that simply doing it once, twice, ten or twenty times, won't necessarily require.  Yet adding weight (resistance), ensures that one will fail before 50 repetitions of a movement have been accomplished -- which is self-defeating, if the greatest value of that movement, is achieved at simply the ability to perform that movement for a minimum of 50 times -- which is the indicator that one has mastered the movement enough to persist at it indefinitely longer, if an occasion should require it.

This persistence of movement, is what makes "work" possible -- or the capacity to endure at anything sufficiently long, as to be meaningful and productive.  One revolution on a bicycle, or one stride, doesn't mean much or get one far, but 50 is likely to be sufficient in getting from one place to any other in the normal organization and layout of their lives -- to accomplish most everything in the normal course of their day.  In that scheme of relevance, a marathon would necessarily be a once-in-a-lifetime event -- if at all necessary, and someone in a large pool of people, would likely volunteer for that task -- in notifying the capitol (next town), that the invaders had arrived but the locals had prevailed -- as one's ultimate sacrifice and act of valor.

More often than not, one wins by being the only person to show up -- after recognizing what really needs to be done, while the masses are doing what everybody else is doing, in a typical duplication of efforts, leading up to the cancellation of everybody else's efforts in a competitive event simply to eliminate everybody else.  That is the ultimate resistance, or workload -- that everybody's efforts are worthless, but only the one -- and everything else was in vain.

Most, therefore, grow out of that competitive mentality at some point in their lives, and have to create a meaning beyond the competition -- for their ultimate fulfillment, as individuals and unique destinies.  That is every person's study of their own lives -- and personal fulfillment not dictated by anybody else, but just deciding to do what is right for themselves -- uniquely.  That is what one person cannot decide for another -- find out for any other.

But the practical and productive movements are not infinite -- and in fact, are surprisingly few.  They are the movements at the extremities of the human body -- of the head, hands and feet -- to do the essential tasks of being human, where we uniquely differentiate from all the other animals and life forms.  The human head, hands and feet are like no other.  All have similarly functioning hearts, lungs, digestive tracts, internal organs.  That part has been perfected for all.  Where we really differentiate and distinguish ourselves uniquely, are at these furthest extremities of evolution -- the farthest reaches of life so far.

And that is what we need to exercise, master, and perfect -- throughout life.

Enhancing Your Strength and Health Throughout Life

Most people think that at some point in life, they have to begin to deteriorate -- and not get better, but at best, simply slow down that decline, and adjust their attitude that is the best they can hope for, and convince themselves, that is not so bad -- as long as they can keep denying that.  That is undeniably the reality of most people's lives -- but is that deterioration absolutely necessary and inevitable, or is life itself, successfully figuring out what needs to be modified in one's behaviors, to change that balance -- and restore it to a positive again.

I think even the most dysfunctional person, would admit that at some point, they made a wrong turn in their lives that has caused their disastrous plunge towards destruction that they are so overwhelmed by that they can no longer think clearly, and have the insight that will allow them to regain their footing on the right path again.  For a few, that has seemed like a long time now, in which all they have experienced and known, is a long, irreversible and irrecoverable "losing streak," and have long ago given up on expecting, much less hoping for anything else.

That is the truth and reality of their "conditioning" -- that has produced the shape and condition they are now in -- and would like to see changed, if they thought that it was even possible anymore.  There is a saying in life, that as long as there is life, there is still hope -- or the possibility for a different outcome than the one that has been trending and accelerating for as long as they can remember now -- and has become their "reality."  But is that reality, their inevitability -- or is there the possibility of a cure, from their own self-inflicted mortal wound?

Of course, not every wound is self-inflicted -- but most are.  Invariably, it was making a decision, or adopting a practice, that one persisted with, that was wrong -- yet wouldn't change, despite the overwhelming evidence, that it was "wrong," so determined one was, that it was right -- no matter how much evidence to the contrary, was evident to every other person but themselves, and it was not everybody else that had to change their thinking, but only themselves, that had to come upon that better understanding, and changing that reality.

You cannot change the outcome -- by not changing anything else.  One has to change the behaviors, that produce that outcome -- unfailingly, and invariably.  Some people will insist that you need their permission to do so -- or for that matter, to do anything -- and they are also part of the problem, and how one became to be conditioned that way -- in thinking that one could not change and improve oneself, until they first sought permission and paid some one else to allow them to improve their own lives.

In fact, the whole idea that people even had a right to their own lives, is an idea that some people and cultures will not allow -- and even kill others, to maintain.  One reads it in the news every day -- as well as in the fairy tales one has been conditioned as young people to inherently believe others are -- and the world is.

It is the affirmation that the situation is hopeless -- unless there is some miraculous intervention by someone else, some greater power, be it the president or some party, that will deliver us from all the problems of the world -- that we are not allowed to solve ourselves, individually, and more effectively -- as the only way it ever can be for every individual -- to live a life of improvement, all through one's life.  But that changes and has to be rediscovered from time to time -- when it no longer works, even if it ever did.

That is a shocking revelation for those who have been educated and convinced that the world (of knowledge),  was always the way it is now -- and should also remain so, forevermore.  That is the aging of knowledge, that also becomes its reality.

So there is this immense challenge throughout life, of remaining in reality, and not fixed in only the knowledge of it -- and then demanding that reality must conform to that knowledge, rather than that the knowledge, must change and adapt to the new realities that are always changing -- and so to be moving with it, is what it means to be "fit" for that survival, and beyond that, to thrive and prosper -- as one's greatest hope for the future, no matter what.  That outlook, is having one's whole life ahead of them -- no matter what.

Then yesterday's weariness and fatigue, can be replaced by tomorrow's revival and resuscitation -- to even greater capabilities than were spent -- thinking they were lost forever.  Instead, they became the directives for new growth -- in the ways one recognized were the new needs, and not just the old -- one thought they could never unburden themselves of until the (ac)cumulative weight of them, dragged them down before ultimately crushing them.  That is what many recognize as the despair of "old age."

But it has very little to do with age, and mostly to do with outlook, attitude and understanding (conditioning) -- which is how people begin to differentiate "in time."