2016-07-22 10:41![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
digitaldiscipline
digitaldisciplinethis may not make a lot of sense at the outset, but i promise it will all coalesce somewhat by the end. the concept/trope of "fridging" - that some unfortunate thing that happens to a female character to catalyze a male character's development as a response to manpain[tm] is very much awake, aware, and alive for me, and sort of comically on display on two fronts.
on the one hand, the deaths of a couple of my most-favored feral cats, whom i had hoped to bring into my household, are part of why i have gone out of my way to be a caretaker for so many. Drake (Magellan's sister) was struck by a car before my renovations in 2012 were complete, and tiny's first litter featured two super-assertively-friendly kittens, who were the unfortunate victims of a well-meaning neighbors to feed them milk because they were vocal and mobile and they succumbed to the improper ingestion of cow's milk before they were weaned.
i don't like seeing needless pain or suffering, especially if it is in my power to help prevent it. so there's that.
On the other hand, one of the things that has rekindled my lifting motivation of late is seeing what it looks like when someone fights for every rep, and trying to apply that to my own practice and training. it's easy to half-ass stuff, or not bring everything to bear on a rep, or whatever - this isn't news to folks who do martial arts, for instance, and it shouldn't be news to me, either - but, as a non-perfectionist, i chafe at the "perfect practice makes perfect" dictat as well; i am much more a zeno's paradox kind of guy, incrementally creeping towards a near-ideal. this is sub-optimal on two fronts - one, you're not going to hit your limits, and, tangentially, you get more out of a rep when you move the bar with speed rather than slowly; F=MA doesn't give a shit.
so, watching Jenn R miss that world record deadlift pull was literally seeing someone try to give 101% of what they have, committing absolutely everything to a lift (her training videos show the same kind of focus and intensity); i honestly am more inspired by the failed attempt at the absolute extreme of her capability, rather than yet another (impressive-as-fuck) successful pull. we've talked briefly about how to develop that and bring it to bear, which is one of many facets of my strength practice that i want to improve in order to achieve the goals i have recently set for myself. i've been putting this into practice this week, after my chance to train with her last weekend - i may not have made every lift this week, but i have sure as shit fought my best fight on every rep (though this still isn't happening every rep of every set, i've ground out some number-of-rep PRs by stomping into this relatively new psychological territory as I remind myself what it looks like when one of the best refuses to give up, and trying to emulate that in my own performance)
so, yeah, i am kind of embracing the trope that is so tiresome and problematic in our imagined fiction, because, for better or worse, "grizzled white cishet dude" is the current protagonist in my personal narrative.
on the one hand, the deaths of a couple of my most-favored feral cats, whom i had hoped to bring into my household, are part of why i have gone out of my way to be a caretaker for so many. Drake (Magellan's sister) was struck by a car before my renovations in 2012 were complete, and tiny's first litter featured two super-assertively-friendly kittens, who were the unfortunate victims of a well-meaning neighbors to feed them milk because they were vocal and mobile and they succumbed to the improper ingestion of cow's milk before they were weaned.
i don't like seeing needless pain or suffering, especially if it is in my power to help prevent it. so there's that.
On the other hand, one of the things that has rekindled my lifting motivation of late is seeing what it looks like when someone fights for every rep, and trying to apply that to my own practice and training. it's easy to half-ass stuff, or not bring everything to bear on a rep, or whatever - this isn't news to folks who do martial arts, for instance, and it shouldn't be news to me, either - but, as a non-perfectionist, i chafe at the "perfect practice makes perfect" dictat as well; i am much more a zeno's paradox kind of guy, incrementally creeping towards a near-ideal. this is sub-optimal on two fronts - one, you're not going to hit your limits, and, tangentially, you get more out of a rep when you move the bar with speed rather than slowly; F=MA doesn't give a shit.
so, watching Jenn R miss that world record deadlift pull was literally seeing someone try to give 101% of what they have, committing absolutely everything to a lift (her training videos show the same kind of focus and intensity); i honestly am more inspired by the failed attempt at the absolute extreme of her capability, rather than yet another (impressive-as-fuck) successful pull. we've talked briefly about how to develop that and bring it to bear, which is one of many facets of my strength practice that i want to improve in order to achieve the goals i have recently set for myself. i've been putting this into practice this week, after my chance to train with her last weekend - i may not have made every lift this week, but i have sure as shit fought my best fight on every rep (though this still isn't happening every rep of every set, i've ground out some number-of-rep PRs by stomping into this relatively new psychological territory as I remind myself what it looks like when one of the best refuses to give up, and trying to emulate that in my own performance)
so, yeah, i am kind of embracing the trope that is so tiresome and problematic in our imagined fiction, because, for better or worse, "grizzled white cishet dude" is the current protagonist in my personal narrative.
