It's Not Me, It's You
AND THE OBSESSION WITH OBSESSION
Authenticity is a buzzword in business online. Makes sense, I guess, when your dealings are done at some remove, but it no longer speaks to our merely walking the walk.
Coinciding, not incidentally, with Brené Brown’s famous TED talk telling us that sharing our imperfections was the straight shot to connection, like so much else exposed to the force multiplier that is the internet where any good is quickly subsumed by the absurd, distortions of this idea are less a casualty of the online marketplace than a feature of it.
Many cite past ratbaggery as qualification or credibility with 'About' pages and bios reading like rap sheets, but the need to be authentic— in the truly cringe-inducing sense— now has business owners introducing themselves by way of searing exposé. Tales of mischief and misery, all trying to outdo the other in their vulnerability.
And while I’m all for second acts and redemption, this obvious tactic doesn’t just leave me cold, it elicits the opposite of the desired effect. And as for those that were once real pricks, you might go about quietly redressing that, instead of mining it.
In either case, I’m now even less inclined to purchase your supplements.
But it works, obviously. And what I know about online marketing could fill a thimble, because this bizarre overshare is one offset only by that other business flavour of the times, and one I find equally bemusing: passion.
A word as far removed from its etymology as my describing its overuse as gay abandon.
Perhaps it’s an Antipodean reserve— certainly compared to the stereotypical loud American, or hand-waving European— but there are very few things in life I’d put in the passion column.
A barely controllable emotion doesn’t sound to me like something you should volunteer on a CV, but these days, if you’re not passionate about facilitating collegial interactions, the next guy will be. Mere enjoyment, even enthusiasm, leaves you looking like an apathetic spectator, certainly not a team player.
But this warping of the norm makes our online world a hall of mirrors, and while much of the problem comes via myth and misinformation and, let's say fraudulent side of the spectrum, much more comes from, what is purported at least, to be the other.
I was talking to a friend recently who said, ‘It’s easy for you, you do this for a living’ and realised, I'm not just missing the mark in conveying this, I too am guilty of these distortions.
In forever banging a fitness and nutrition drum, one bolstered by voluntary discomforts like cold showers and other hard things like cold, rainy, early mornings, you might imagine me to be some kind of fitness Terminator.
And this is neither complete nor accurate.
So today, less in the interests of authenticity than providing what I hope to be some useful context, I’ll reveal a bit more about who I am, what I do and what I promote, beginning with the confession these are not, necessarily, the same thing.
Some days I enjoy slothing it. I enjoy doughnuts, chips, burgers, vodka, whisky, and even, very occasionally, a cigar.
Antithetical to health and fitness, obviously. You don’t see me encouraging them like I would meditation because, in my opinion, only one of them warrants promotion. Authenticity, sacrilege? Hypocrisy, even?
You decide.
But there’s a keyword above. And it’s not burger, nor vodka, and it’s not the qualification ‘some days’. It’s the word enjoy. I am super-attuned to the fact that if I have been doing nothing for 3 days in a row, I’m no longer enjoying it. And on a Tuesday at lunchtime, I’ll just have a water, thanks.
And good luck finding anywhere I’ve described fitness as being purposed to anything other than one end: life.
Along with all the fitness-specific stuff, you’ll also see themes of personal responsibility, independence and critical thinking, so if I’m any sort of role model, it’s not of what you should and shouldn’t do, but of you doing what you decide.
Not me. Not anybody else.
I don’t spend all day getting fit. My working day is much the same as yours, I have admin, writing and consults but the bulk of it is reading studies, blog posts, and articles about behavioural psychology, fitness and nutrition. It consists of reading and learning how to best get and keep you fit. In a manner that serves you best.
The same knowledge I have condensed and dispensed to you. So if you’ve been paying attention this decade past, we’re on a level playing field.
Certainly, I do live by the values I profess. I’m physically fit because I carve out time for it. And less than you think. I enjoy being able to deadlift twice my bodyweight, do 15 pullups, handstands, touch my toes, run for an hour or sprint up a given hill, no drama.
There’s that word again: enjoy. And these are not amazing standards of fitness— although it depends what room I’m in— but the point is only that they are good enough for me.
And the further point is that it’s never the numbers or the exercise but that it is all purposed to that greater end. It allows me— with a considerable buffer zone— to do what I want to do. Fitness for the sake of it, especially in light of everything else I want to do with my time, is a waste of it.
But if you want to be able to do 300 pushups for the hell of it, then go for it. More power to you. And I’m happy to help you get there. But there’s no shortage of trainers looking to force an ideology, dogma or preferred training tool on their clients and customers all in various stages of mini-me schooling.
But the standard dose of Imposter syndrome, the transgression of personal sovereignty and obvious hubris in telling anybody what to do, all underpinned by the illusion of free will, combine to leave me on very shaky ground when it comes to coaching.
To presume to point a man to the right and ultimate goal—to point with a trembling finger in the RIGHT direction is something only a fool would take upon himself.
- Hunter S. Thompson
The only way I can reconcile this is by keeping myself right out of it. I point you to the universal rules. It’s up to you, if or how you play the game.
But it’s these universal rules, along with other Leftfield frameworks, that help me identify the crucial tipping point of enough, leading to progress in whatever endeavour I’m focused on at the time. They afford me the luxury of less. And they will do the same for you.
The wanting it more than breathing brigade may well apply if you want to play in the NBA, but I don’t, and nor do you. And while I don't doubt the authenticity of some juiced-up musclebound gym rats or green-juiced-up health mavens living their respective personas to the nth degree, by contrast to what I propose, these are caricatures in the most literal sense.
At the opposite and—in my view— equally misguided end of the spectrum, it’s not easy to do so little, to eat so much rubbish, and to do it consistently enough that fitness is a pipe dream. Those who do might pay a little more attention to just how hard they work at it. And to just how boring it is.
Because it’s infinitely harder than anything I ever do. I apply enough discipline, in just the right places, and I enjoy the results. That’s it.
Our endless exposure to extremes veils all middle ground. It makes the idea of a fitness practice (including exercise, nutrition, and broader lifestyle behaviours) both reflective of and complementary to who we are and everything else going on in our lives, impossible to even imagine.
My primary professional interest is in proving to the general population— to you— that you can have this without it ruling your life.
And given you can, you are crazy not to.
But it should come as no surprise to learn I am not passionate about fitness. Anymore than I am passionate about brushing my teeth. I suppose you could say I’m passionate about not losing my teeth, but even then, you’d be pushing it. For me, fitness is the same. As uncelebrated and as unmissable as brushing my teeth.
I enjoy my job, certainly, but, insofar as it does map on to my personal life, my professional hope is that you might come to view fitness just as dispassionately in yours.
If that’s what you want.
Enjoy your weekend.
- OLI