I hope you
choke. I wish misfortune upon you. I hope you snap and break, that you fail,
that you suffer defeat and that it all falls apart right in front of your eyes. I hope you experience unfathomable pain,
misery, torment and anguish. Why? Because the only way to experience this is to
completely overreach. To way exceed your
capabilities and limitations and go completely beyond the scope of your
abilities. To actually have finally
pushed yourself so hard that you break.
In short, I hope that you bite off more than you can chew, and as such,
I hope you choke.
There are worse ways to go
People wish
for success for others, and it’s the complete wrong direction to hope for. Success breeds stagnation. Successful people are too content. Failure motivates change. It is the catalyst for improvement. And the people that do everything possible to
avoid failure are in turn simply and ironically failing at a much grander
level. They refuse to experience failure
to the point that they simply never try hard enough to be able to fail, which
in turn means not enough to succeed either.
They live lukewarm existences free of pain, misery, and anguish…but also
free of the thrill of victory and the elation of overcoming.
Make no
mistake; I am praying for your demise.
This isn’t some cheesy “darkest before the dawn” sort of thing. I’m hoping that the dawn comes and inflicts a
vicious sunburn on you that eventually gets infected and causes you to
die. I’m hoping that you choke; not that
you eventually spit out what you bit off.
But why? Because to reach that
point, you’ll have had to have broken through a LOT of different plateaus and
barriers. To reach the point where you
reach has FINALLY exceeded your grasp, you’ll have passed by a ton of people
still refusing to even try. You’ll
surpass many self-imposed limitations and restrictions and governors people put
on themselves simply out of fear, and you’ll evolve into something far
superior.
This would be a good start
And then you
will expire. Make no mistake about it:
you will be the cause of your own demise.
But man, what power huh? That is
the absolute peak of power: to be able to control one’s own destiny. To not be a victim of fate, but instead the
one at the reigns. The one who dictates
and decides the future. You crumble and
fail and ultimately die, but by your own hand, on your own terms. A violent death, facing off against dragons
and demons you have absolutely no business whatsoever facing, compelled only by
your own hubris and the believe that nothing is beyond your own abilities. Doesn’t that seem so much more satisfying
than peacefully expiring in your bed, slowly dying of absolutely nothing?
This is the
consequence of pursuing greatness; it WILL consume you. You are a human, which makes you a finite
being. You have an expiration date
stamped on you from birth. You will hit
a peak, after which time you will simple become worse and worse until you
eventually expire. If you spend your existence
constantly pushing the envelope, one day it will push back. But the thing is, this will happen
regardless. The only difference between
the person chasing greatness and the person chasing mediocrity is that the
latter will get to do it for longer…but why would you want to? What could possibly be your motivation to rack
up some sort of high score for longest amount of time spent accomplishing
nothing? Yeah, if you chase a 700lb
bench, you’re probably going to get stapled and crushed in your 40s or 50s when
the strength reaper eventually says “no”, but at least you made it that far,
rather than waiting to expire at the age of 90 because you slipped in the
bathtub, broke your hip and died.
Or then there's this
At least if
you choke it means you tried to bite off more than you could chew. At least if you fail, it means you were
trying to succeed. No one cares about an
undefeated record if it also contains no wins and no losses, and a guy who
steps in the ring with a record of 0 wins and 400 defeats is a goddamn warrior,
because nothing stops that person. There
is nothing more terrifying than a human with no quit in them, because you legitimately
do not know what they are capable of.
Their max potential has yet to be realized, and you are watching it
unfold in front of you as they fail, fall, get crushed, and get right back up
and try again and again. As they keep
biting off more chunks and painfully swallowing them before moving onto the
next bigger bite.
It’s why I
hope you choke. Wish peace on your
enemies, so that they never grow into the unstoppable monster you will one day
be. Wish joy on those that hold you
back. Pray for the safety of those you
despise. Hope for them no opportunities
to overcome and grow strong. Take it all
for yourself, and grow into something hideous.
Become an affront to all that is good and pure and beautiful, because
you will in turn be strong. And when
people see what you choked on, they will be disgusted you ever took such a big
bite in the first place, because the thought to do so will have never crossed
their mind.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletePretty sure every article of yours that I've read comes packaged with the bosu-ball squat guy
ReplyDeleteKeep 'em coming!
DeleteIt's a running gag. There are a few that make it through without, as something of a wink to my regular readers.
DeleteI've done this, with my computer science courses. Dropped out, went back, dropped out, failed, with little more than an associate's degree and a lot of debt. Basically realized I just had no business in STEM.
ReplyDeleteTaking accounting courses now and basically appreciating it a lot more.
Are these kinds of posts inspired by ideas of Nietzsche ? Other inspirations ?
ReplyDeleteI would also suggest the idea of antifragility, by Taleb Nassim. ( which I think he was influenced by Nietzsche, too )
Just stuff rattling around in my head. I'm less inspired by Nietzsche and more finding myself in agreement with him whenever I read him. You could observe elements of his "Will to Power" in this.
DeleteNever read Nassim. I'll have to look into it.
I signed up for a 30k in August. In South Texas. Start at high noon. Given my past couple runs at 90+ degrees...your hope may come true. Everyone thinks I'm nuts to do this. But if I manage to pull it off, or if in my failure I simply become one those people who has learned to run in the summer heat, it will be worth it. Provided of course I don't "choke" on this bite and die of heatstroke.
ReplyDeleteGreat essay as usual. Though you may be my insanity enabler.
That sounds like a phenomenal challenge. Good on you dude!
Delete