Listen to the Body - Or Not

 Listen to your body they say.  I say - that is only partly true.   

My opinion -   Yeah, when it screams pain, you need to listen.  When you are extending it past the good recovery process, and you know it, you might want to listen to the body.  Or, maybe you don't. 

Over 40 years of this tells me that my body is lazy.  My body is pure creature, craving comfort and ease. My body would never do anything unless I made it to and it would become completely sedentary and dedicated to rapid atrophy. Left to its own will, the body would kill itself with me in it, with its cravings for ease and comfort. 

The body doesn't have a brain of its own.  It only responds to satisfying its own desires even if it kills itself.  It doesn't think ahead.  It doesn't consider the consequences of its inaction.  The bottom line is the body may be talking but it doesn't have a brain.  Would you listen to someone without a brain?  

The last three mornings I went out to do my mountain bike ride and a short brick run.  And each morning, I almost quit the first fifteen minutes into it.  The body was moaning and groaning, complaining that I was pushing it too hard with too much too soon, complaining about the heat and how I might mess myself up in this heat if I didn't find a cool place to hide out from effort.  And then it reminds me how old I am and how I should be taking it easy, not pushing in this heat   Yes, the body may be talking but it doesn't have a brain.  Sounds like some people I have met.  

I'm the one with a brain.  I'm the one who makes the decision "to be or not to be."  Anybody can cave into comfort and listen to your body.  And you and I have the brain to decide:   do we want to be just anybody?