Discomfort is required in life. It is as simple as that. If you try to avoid discomfort, you have already lost. Discomfort is the infinite game that we all must play if we wish to live a healthy and fulfilling life. Nature requires it, our physiology and cells require it, and there is no way around it—discomfort is required in life.
Nothing better illustrates this than astronauts. Flying through space without the stress of gravity pulling down on their bones, requiring muscular contractions to fight it, bone and muscle loss becomes a serious problem, as does a diet made of previously made, processed foods. Astronauts are put in an environment where much of the daily discomfort of gravity is removed, and coincidentally, are placed into an artificial life that is rather similar to many current Americans: stationary and just floating along through space and time, watching their bodies fall apart. (And yes, the actually act of launching into space requires a lot of prep and discomfort, but we are focusing on the non gravity part here…). This environment must be avoided if possible, but if not, must be fought by all means.
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You must stress your bones to avoid bone loss, fractures, and osteoporosis.
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You must stress your muscles, contract them repeatedly and intensely tearing them to remain their size, or ideally, grow larger.
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You must lift uncomfortably heavy weights to stress your neurologic system and make it fire more effectively while stressing the muscles and bones.
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You must stress your brain through intense thought, reading, critical thinking, and intellectual discomfort to stop it from turning into a bowl of jelly.
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You must walk far and often to avoid stasis and aid in pumping blood through your body while placing weight on your lower extremities.
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You must search and gather food, prepare meals, and cook them to nourish your body and soul.
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You must grow plants, tend a garden, and use your brain and hands to create thing, to the uncomfortable degree that your hands become callous from effort.
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You must avoid the “comfort” of sitting on your couch, watching TV (idiot boxes, as my friend calls them), devices and other sources of brain rot that physically and mentally feel comfortable but work to derail your efforts to stay smart, sane, and healthy.
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You must avoid making yourself an astronaut.
In other words, astronauts understand the importance of discomfort and avoiding just “floating” along. They could just float along, eating premade packaged and processed foods, shooting their garbage down a hop into space, watching as they lost muscle mass, strength, physical function, bone density, and a functioning brain.
In fact, astronauts understand the vital importance of avoiding a stationary float through space so much so that before their mission,they must undergo rigorous training and develop patterns and routines to combat the mental and physical stresses of a dormant and nonimpactful environment. Ponder that one for a minute; the environment that much of American pushes—nonstop television (idiot boxes), little reflective thought, no stress on the body or bones, little movement and limited physical activity, Wall E type premade foods readily available through a straw, no preparing or cooking meals, astronaut ice cream—is so bad for us that we spend million of dollars and countless hours training astronauts to overcome these harmful avoiders of discomfort.
Take a lesson from them and embrace discomfort, get off the couch, turn off the idiot boxes, put down your devices and embrace some discomfort.
Embrace discomfort.
Don’t be an astronaut.
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