Physical pain for internal gains: The kinetic method of development
Another passion of mine which I have not deigned to make into a focal point on this blog, but which has also had a strong transformative affect in my life, is the practice of martial arts. Not for the celestial, incense-laden, chanting, chi-channeling motifs we might imagine. But for something far more primal, far more basic.
Walking into a martial arts studio as a newbie will be personally challenging from the start. You are somewhere new and unfamiliar, and will immediately be put into a situation where you will "compete" with people who have been doing this a lot longer than you, and who will almost certainly best you. This is to be expected, but that doesn't take away the sting of being sub-par. Human instinct recoils at the thought of not being good enough in comparison to our peers. And you could see the next point coming: that's good, because it forces you to grow.
But martial arts, or other physical/athletic endeavors are particularly good for this sort of growth because in addition to those internal discomforts, you are also likely to get punched in the face (or tossed, or outran/outlifted). Internally, this is humiliating. Externally, this is painful. These can produce great gains on your journey of personal development.
As with travel, they will not necessarily produce great gains. I don't need to remind you of how often professional athletes are egotists and narcissists. There is a right and a wrong way to approach physical training.
Yet, we are in this corporeal realm inextricably linked to our bodies and therefore must not disregard the connection between our minds and our bodies. In some senses, most of what you experience can be deduced to physicality. You feel a runner's high after running, or full after eating. Even emotional states are the result of (physical) chemicals and signals in our brains reacting in different ways.
Travel is physical. It is about changing your geographic location on Earth; a fact which the dissenters might mention in opposition to the supposed inner growth one could experience from traveling. Yet, the physical affects the mental and emotional in profound ways. We don't call someone enlightened for whom this is not true; we call them a psychopath (no offense to psychopaths).
The basic benefit of physical training is to get you accustomed to discomfort - especially in a group setting -, struggle, and even failure. You will become less sensitive over time, less incapable of shouldering the burden of various discomforts. When you've already defecated publicly in the course of attempting a grueling marathon, how uncomfortable/embarrassed can you be to say the wrong word in a foreign language, or to be the oldest person in your college class? And even if you still feel particularly nervous about navigating foreign environments, you will yet have the mental fortitude needed to push through to completion and see the fruits of your labor.
Afflict yourself, and be free.
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