What does not kill me makes me stronger.
After three to four years, I’m exercising again. It’s been a month of going to the gym, of, shockingly, waking up at 7 and biking1 to the gym 6km away, 500m down the high slopes of the mountain, from Kalpa to Reckong Peo, Peo to Kalpa.
—and in the evening, I go for a 50-minute walk up and down the lovely slopes.
It was hard initially, my entire existence was against it, but I’m enjoying it now — so much so that I hate when I miss it. My posture is becoming more firm and confident. There’s less self-disgust in my eyes (lol), in my gaze when I meet it in the mirror. I’m turning against myself, against the self that I had let myself become in recent years.
I remember these words by Friedrich Nietzsche from 1888:
From the military school of life. — What does not kill me makes me stronger.
Never knew lifting little things and pushing and pulling my body against the forces of gravity can be so powerful. I had forgotten.
Life is good but it will be better in a year, for I’ve fixed my claws to want to continue this not for a year but for life. The claws with which I will shred my old self every day, year after year.
I remember these words by Frank Herbert from 1985:
Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty.
bike = motorcycle in India↩︎