It’s Not Exercise. It’s Exorcism.
I share this story with permission from my brother.
My twin brother has a routine where he does a combination of intense walking, hill climbing, and a series of martial art moves, and stretching for a couple of hours every day at a nearby park. Every, single, day. Truth be known, it’s more than a couple of hours.
He’s built quite the reputation as the one to watch by those who frequent the same park. They are fascinated by his diligence as they observe him, day in and day out. Weather never being a deterrent.
I remember him calling me one day saying that he just came in from exercising in hurricane winds. I didn’t know whether to say, wow, way to go, or you’re an idiot.
People often approach him, curious as to what motivates him, and why he’s so committed to his practice.
Just the other day a man stopped to ask him, “Do you follow a particular exercise program, as I’m curious to read more about it?” My brother without missing a beat, “It’s not exercise, it’s exorcism.” And the man paused and said, “I get it.”
My brother is a successful screenwriter and director in film and television. He has a wicked sense of humor, is a fantastic writer, teacher, creator, and has the same work intensity as he does with his exercise.
As May is mental health month, I wanted to share this with you as he did with me, because, although he jokes around coming up with brilliant lines, they are personal to him. And it became personal to me. Because apart from my laughing, and loving his writing, that statement was the closest thing to an explanation for all the days that I too overdo my exercise training.
I realize then that I’m exercising for other reasons other than to stay in healthy, fit shape. I’m trying to exhaust myself. To quell the noise in my mind when the world appears as if it’s going mad, or to ease my crazy-ass thoughts when things don’t make sense to me, or for that matter when I struggle with what seems to be a lack of kindness, or my need to find some kind of sanity. It’s a feeling of not only trying to ease my mind but to sometimes run from it.
This kind of intensity helps me to ease whatever feelings I may be having when the world is just too heavy a place.
And then. Then, I’m reminded and comforted by one of my favorite philosophers, Alan Watts, where he wrote, “When we dispel the illusions that we think our thoughts instead of being just a stream of thoughts, when we lose the notion that we feel our feelings instead of being just feelings, then life is no longer a burden. Feeling feelings is a redundant expression, like saying that you hear sounds when hearing is sound — there are no sounds that are not heard. Seeing is sight — you don’t see sights.”
And this. This is my reason, my need to find hope, and to create ways to bring more hope into this world for others.
When you’re wondering why you may be doing something a little less conventional (whatever that really means), or perhaps being obsessive to ease your fears, pain, anxiety, and low feelings, know that in that moment in time you’re finding a way to feel better. It’s also recognizing a need to want to control the situation. When you feel that you have little control over what’s going on around you, you know that the one thing that you do have control over, is you.
Or, know that, in the words of Alan Watts, “You’re under no obligation to be the same person you were 5 minutes ago.”
It’s a reminder to my brother, and you, that all of us find ways to best lead our lives, especially when we have bad days, low weeks, downright crappy times in our lives. It’s those times where we find the resources, tools and practices that help. And then again, all we have is this very moment in time.
It only seems appropriate to end with another Alan Watts quote where perhaps there is solace in knowing that “It is impossible to be in anything other than the present moment. We cannot relive the past; we cannot enter the future; we literally can only be in the present moment — it is impossible to be anywhere else.”