The Survival of the Fit

  The problem with making everything into a competitive activity is that there is only one winner, and everybody else has to lose -- no matter how worthy their efforts and achievements.  That is true regardless if one is doing what is beneficial to themselves most of all -- which really ought to be the true measure of what everybody does in life.  Is it good in and of itself, and not, whether one wins a trophy at the end.  That is making everything in life into a trivial activity -- and not the valuable one each life can measure for itself.

That was the operant mentality of the 1970s that thought the only reason for doing anything, was to be first and foremost, and everything else did not matter, when in fact, the competition for that supreme distinction, was the least important concern.  It doesn't matter how low one's body fat is, or target heart rate, or for that matter, how much one can bench press, squat and deadlift -- and those concerns get in the way of achieving optimal functional health --  which is not measured by those things but the qualities of life that escape narrow measurements -- and become meaningless once they are achieved.

It does not matter how much one already knows -- as it does how much one is capable of learning beyond that.  That is what trips up a lot of people thinking their past accomplishments are what matter -- when the greater life lies ahead, waiting to be discovered.  What that is, nobody knows yet -- but those thinking it is simply the same thing -- but a little more, or more than everybody else has, is not thinking expansively enough -- particularly to their own existence, which is really what matters.  That is the meaning of life for every individual -- and not just what one individual has determined must be the criteria for everyone else.

Such thinking is not a mature mind -- but the quintessential immature mind that believes the rest of the world exists only to fulfill their own needs and ego.  So what they think is important, is what everybody else in the world must also -- and compete against them for singular primacy.  Those are usually to be found in the arenas competing for fame and fortune -- thinking everybody else in the world showed up just to cheer them on.  Of course, those are the familiar celebrities who think that all of life is a popularity contest -- and they who get the most "likes" or toys, wins -- or some such eternal glory and place in the record books.  So they are quick to enshrine themselves -- and begrudgingly others, for their self-aggrandizing behaviors -- as though they were great attainments of humankind.

Nobody cares what you can bench press, squat, deadlift, or target your heart rate and body fat -- because they are not great achievements in every life, because each is just a pebble on the journey to greater individual attainment -- and was never meant to be the universal standard by which all are judged for ultimate merit.  How each achieves and actualizes their own life is a deeply personal and significant thing -- and not the gross measurements that self-aggrandizing and self-promoting bit players want everybody else to believe as the eternal attainments and standards which will stand the test of time.  That is for posterity to determine properly.

So survival is not only for the "fittest" but awaits the judgment of time -- to prove that was so.  It may even seen that one was doing everything wrong -- but in the end, turned out to be right, while those who thought they were doing everything right, and had all the spoils to "prove" it, end their days as mere shadows of themselves long ago.  So much so, that it now seems so illusory -- and may as well never happened.  Time and age is very cruel in that respect -- as it reveals who really was right and wrong -- in doing what they did.

People don't age badly because they did all the right things -- nor do they age well doing all the wrong things -- as much as the mainstream media would like us to believe there are no differences, and it is wrong to try to distinguish the good from the bad.  Obviously, that is why most of them are working in that media -- getting paid to convince others of what is not true.  If it were for the reason of telling the truth as the truth, there would be no reason to pay them so richly -- for selling their souls for fame and fortune.  They would simply be satisfied with knowing the truth for once in their lives -- and the clouds of confusion and dysfunction would part, revealing the stairway to heaven.

But we never get there as long as there are those thinking to be the sole and exclusive winners in their battle to be the fittest -- as most worthy, and deserving of survival.  The stairway is vast, and will allow many to get there -- and not just the one who can emerge from the narrow tunnel as the singular winner.  However, that does not mean that any idea is as good as any other, because there are consequences, cause and effect.  Things don't just happen -- no matter how hard we want them to.  And there are many who cultivate that path to wisdom -- thinking wishful-thinking gets them there, so all they have to do is want it badly enough -- while taking no positive steps to increase those probabilities.  That's how the possible, becomes more probable -- or less.  In neither case is it the same, or doesn't matter.  It all matters -- none more than others -- and wishing it were not so, won't make it so.

Every generation has its own unique challenges, and the foolish, are those rewriting the past -- rather than discovering the new, and making it so.  But we try to see the whole of life through the eye of a needle -- and thinking that is all there is.  Those are the obvious competitive types -- but even more devious and undermining, are those who actually believe their own lies.  They are simply and abjectly lost -- because they don't know how to begin to find out for themselves, the truth of any matter.  And finding out, is the name of the game, what life is all about.  Even some with all the money in the world, will not be able to buy a clue.  The world is run very differently than what they thought to be true.  So while it seemed like they were on the top, shortly as was admonished, the first shall become the last, and the last, first.  You just never know when it happens -- and the first will be the last to know.  By then it is too late; all their chances have been used up.

One doesn't say this to mock the dying.  They are consumed with their own problems -- but for the living and the young, the new world awaits them -- but not simply by repeating the old ways that didn't work for anybody -- so far.  The new way has to be discovered and created -- and only such a life is unprecedentedly good.

This robust health lies beyond a single metric to measure -- which is the underlying flaw of all our previous understanding.  It merely accumulated when what was needed, was to subsume all the others in a greater, integrated understanding of the whole of life -- and not simply the accumulation of broken, fragmented pieces -- that tell us very little of the whole.  That is the new, higher understanding of what it means to be fit -- for life.  It is not about wasting the heart beats -- and thinking it will be made up some way in the future.  It all begins right now -- and where it ends, nobody knows.

That is the survival of the fit.

Doing All the Right Things

 Most people will readily admit that they are not perfect -- and have not lived a perfect life -- but that should not stop them from trying.  Those imperfect moments accumulate over a lifetime to produce what we know as aging -- the failure or inability to respond appropriately to all the challenges and opportunities life brings.  Bad things don't just happen, and neither does good things.  They require some effort on our part, some action, some involvement on our part -- and not just somebody else, some god, who is responsible for everything turning out the way they have -- and over a lifetime, there's nothing one could have done at any point -- to turn things around, and alter the outcome of what they feel is inevitable -- and fated.

That is the usual regard we have for "aging," rather than the much more state-of-the-art realization that is the accumulation of all our past deeds, words and thoughts -- and we could have done it better, and that was the whole point.  At no point should we have given up and stopped trying -- to do one's best.  However, that does not mean that one has to bench press, squat and deadlift more than they ever had before, and in fact, continuing to think that way, is a well-proven failure -- that one must find another way -- even if they have to create it themselves.

What they can do -- can be anything.  It doesn't have to be what everybody else is doing -- to disastrous effect.  Obviously, exercise that is impossible, difficult or painful to do, is not the answer to the age-old problems of why people fail.  It flat out doesn't work no matter how much of it one does -- until finally they simply give up in despair, and then give up on everything.  One certainly is entitled to find out what works -- if for nobody else but oneself, especially when following the herd, never delivers the results as promised.

It's not illegal to do what works -- and hasn't been previously sanctioned by the governing bodies who claim exclusive jurisdiction on such matters -- and in fact, that they own the turf.  How that came about is anybody's guess -- but usually it is to those who presume that authority, and nobody thinks to challenge it.

However, when many of its best advocates and acolytes are dropping dead prematurely, one is right to question whether that is a fate one wants for themselves.  What is the bigger picture objective?  For most, that is living as long as possible in the best health possible -- and everything else is a secondary, or moot concern.  That seems to imply everything else.  A momentary and fleeting best is usually lost in the greater scheme of things.

Successful longterm investing is the same way -- rewarding only if it lasts -- and not simply making a fortune to lose a fortune just as quickly.  That is the siren call of those promising they can make one a quick fortune -- but not necessarily so that one can walk away from the casino with that fortune.  "Many are called, but few are chosen."  That is the plight and quandary of modern life.  Easy come, but easy go -- and where the wheel stops, may leave a lot with less than they started out with.  So the quick gains, are not the point -- but a lifetime of sustained improvement is what is life-changing.

There may have been a time when life was short, nasty and brutal, when one had to grab each spoil as though it might be their last -- but in a different time, that orientation may serve them ill -- except as a self-fulfilling prophecy.  Yes, they win, but don't live long enough to enjoy any of it.  That was the fate of the original Marathon runner -- who announced that the Greeks had prevailed, and promptly died -- and was celebrated thereafter because he was no longer among them.  We don't necessarily have to be that guy.

Nor are similar sacrifices required for the benefit of everybody else anymore.  People don't have to be thrown into the volcano to appease the gods.  Communities no longer have to enforce rigid conformity to ensure their continued survival -- or encourage development only in one ideal for survival, which was invariably who could tolerate the most pain, torture and suffering -- even if inflicted upon themselves.  Rather, the healing of oneself became the road to personal salvation and resurrection.

If that is the case, it doesn't matter what anybody else thinks they ought to be doing; they can simply do what works -- as self-evident proof that it works.  Everybody else can continue with what is obviously not working -- but they are compelled to do -- and think that is all there is.  The suppression of any other alternatives is not brutal, but just as effective -- that one wouldn't even think of it.  That would be that exercise can and should be easy -- in order for it to be possible to do all one's life -- with no reservations and limitations -- because it is the doing that is the magic, and not the theory and explanations that don't work.

As in the investing example, it is not necessary to understand the why -- only the what.  The why is a separation and division from the reality and actuality of the matter -- and serves no purpose.  If one gets the desirable results each and every time, it is not necessary to have a why -- apart from the what is.  It is not like one is advising one to do something dangerous and difficult, but quite the opposite -- doing the possible as the necessary.  And in that doing, is the manifestation of that possibility and reality.

One is not asking anyone to do 100 pushups or 100 pullups -- but only what they can do, for 100 repetitions.  It can be a movement of their own design -- and purpose.  Doing that everyday, will make them good at doing that -- and there is no other action (movement) that is more important to do.  It is as simple as that -- and the longer one lives, the more they realize that.  That is the integration of the mind and body -- that is the resistance.