|   Lance essay: Back In The Saddle | Mikey
Nov 27, 2001 4:42 PM | | From Forbes ASAP:
Back in the Saddle
Lance Armstrong, Forbes ASAP, 12.03.01
For The World's Best Cyclist, Pleasure Comes From Pain
I become a happier man each time I suffer.
Suffering is as essential to a good life, and as inextricable, as bliss. The old saying that you should live each day as if it's your last is a nice sentiment, but it doesn't work. Take it from me. I tried it once, and here's what I learned: If I pursued only happiness, and lived just for the moment, I'd be a no-account with a perpetual three-day growth on my chin. Cancer taught me that.
Before cancer, whatever I imagined happiness to be, pretty soon I wore it out, took it for granted, or threw it away. A portfolio, a Porsche, a coffee machine--these things were important to me. So was my hair. Then I lost them, including the hair. When I was 25, I was diagnosed with advanced testicular cancer, which had metastasized into my lungs and brain. I sold the car, gave up my career as a world-class cyclist, lost a good deal of money, and barely hung on to my life.
When I went into remission, I thought happiness would mean being self-indulgent. Not knowing how much time I had left, I did not intend to ever suffer again. I had suffered months of fear, chemotherapy so strong it left burn marks under my skin, and surgery to remove two tumors. Happiness to me then was waking up.
I ate Mexican food, played golf, and lay on the couch. The pursuit of happiness meant going to my favorite restaurant and pursuing a plate of enchiladas with tomatillo sauce.
But one day my wife, Kristin, put down her fork and said, "You need to decide something: Are you going to be a golf-playing, beer-drinking, Mexican-food-eating slob for the rest of your life? If you are, I'll still love you. But I need to know, because if so, I'll go get a job. I'm not going to sit at home while you play golf."
I stared at her.
"I'm so bored," she said.
Suddenly, I understood that I was bored, too. The idleness was forced; I was purposeless, with nothing to pursue. That conversation changed everything. I realized that responsibility, the routines and habits of shaving in the morning with a purpose, a job to do, a wife to love, and a child to raise--these were the things that tied my days together and gave them a pattern deserving of the term living.
Within days I was back on my bicycle. For the first time in my life, I rode with real strength and stamina and purpose. Without cancer, I never would have won a single Tour de France. Cancer taught me a plan for more purposeful living, and that in turn taught me how to train and to win more purposefully. It taught me that pain has a reason, and that sometimes the experience of losing things--whether health or a car or an old sense of self--has its own value in the scheme of life. Pain and loss are great enhancers.
People ask me why I ride my bike for six hours a day; what is the pleasure? The answer is that I don't do it for the pleasure. I do it for the pain. In my most painful moments on the bike, I am at my most self-aware and self-defining. There is a point in every race when a rider encounters the real opponent and realizes that it's...himself. You might say pain is my chosen way of exploring the human heart.
That pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it subsides. And when it does, something else takes its place, and that thing might be called a greater space for happiness. We have unrealized capacities that only emerge in crisis--capacities for enduring, for living, for hoping, for caring, for enjoying. Each time we overcome pain, I believe that we grow.
Cancer was the making of me: Through it I became a more compassionate, complete, and intelligent man, and therefore a more alive one. So that's why I ride, and why I ride hard. Because it makes me hurt, and so it makes me happy. |
| Great essay.... | Eric F
Nov 27, 2001 5:47 PM | | Back when I was working as a Ranger at Philmont Scout Ranch and the kids would whine about having to hike soooo far with sooo much weight on their backs I'd just say "Pain is weakness leaving your body." Like the cliche' old statement goes... No pain, no gain. |
| re: Lance essay: Back In The Saddle | fireboy
Nov 28, 2001 7:42 AM | | amen!! Since being released by my oncologist (cancer doc), I have tried to not take things, situations, or people for granted. They may not be there tomorrow, or I may not be. Cancer, (even though mine was found early and I didn't have to suffer as much as Lance) rubbed my mortality right in my nose. I found out who my friends are. I realized that I had a greater affect on the people around me than I would have ever thought. Since being released, I have been on the bike every day, for two reasons. First, the health benefits. Second, the way the bike makes me feel....alive. Just feeling the air travel in and out of my lungs and the ache and strain in each muscle once again rubs my mortality in my face......and I revel in it!!! I am no where near the athlete that is Lance. I wouldn't even begin to profess to ever reach near that level. Sheesh, most avid roadies and serious XC'ers in this area could crush me. But I am out there...pedaling....breathing....sweating...living....and I love it. Mikey...thanks for posting this!!! Lance's book and the words of a wise friend (traildog) made me look forward to getting back on the bike after my ordeal.
Terry |
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