Buddha Bike

  • The Courage to be disliked – Book review

    The Courage to be Disliked is a popular Japanese book that “teaches us the simple yet profound lessons required to liberate our real selves and find lasting happiness.” Big claim.

    I read this book in March 2019, and according to Goodreads, rated it 4 stars. I liked it, but nothing really clicked. Comrades, tasks, vertical relationships. What? The book plays out as a simple dialogue between young and old man, which was easy to read but I couldn’t connect with all these different terms. I tried, I put together a google slide deck, I sketched a bit, drew some diagrams, but otherwise forgot all about it.

    Below, I’ve revisited some of the key themes that I think are important and how I think about them now. If you’re interested you should give it a read, you might get something out of it.

    The past

    Really? I thought the past makes you who you are? What about trauma? High school? Nope. Most of us ‘resolve’ and settle into a familiar track, whether that’s positive or negative. The tricky thing is you and only you need to make the decision to change your habits, which is hard because it’s easy to talk yourself out of such things.

    Ego

    The ‘courage to be disliked’ is really a fancy way of saying ‘liking yourself’. Instead, I interpreted this as ‘f*** the haters’, which is not quite the point. When it comes to relationships, we invent many judgements about others that are usually not true. Believing this type of thinking seems to cause great unhappiness.

    In the book, the young guy is so adamant that his problems are important, intractable and unique. Our misfortune tends to feels very important and special, from a stubbed toe to a car crash. Humans are very good at fashioning these bubbles that become disconnected from reality. This view of the world applies directly to our relationships, where we obsesses over inferiority and endlessly compare.

    Giving

    The old man tells the young man to stop being such a special snowflake. If you can feel at ease with yourself, it’s completely natural to be interested and helpful to others. This is where a lot of feeling of goodwill, compassion and yep, the ‘h’ word comes from. There is no agenda. On the flipside, if you are angry and inward focused, it is easy to feel separate from others because, well that’s the way it feels! I believe this is a negative loop that can spin very fast and in some cases shoot you straight for intel-land . If we have a family member who is sick, we shouldn’t be concerned with anything aside from helping (not their response, complaints, side remarks, or any other thoughts you have about them) – because you love them, you’re physically able to and you feel good doing so.

    Courage

    Another idea I couldn’t connect up was ‘courage’. What does courage have to do with interpersonal relationships? The author encourages calm, objective self-worth and in a similar way that a large rock is ‘strong’, courage is something you get for free.

    ‘Seperation of tasks’

    The chief task in life is simply this: to identify and separate matters so that I can say clearly to myself which are externals not under my control, and which have to do with the choices I actually control.

    Epictetus

    Lastly, in a similar way to how Stoicism ignored events out of our control, a ton of suffering emanates from general confusion and misappropriation of your attention and energy. If you feel some shame and embarrassment by a stranger who you interact with for 3 seconds, think deeply about what that says about you.

    Rather than detached or ruminating, it’s possible to be bemused or stoic or equanimous. Like standing watching a stray dog chase its tail. Ultimately you have no skin in the game. Seperation of tasks was a confusing phrase but it’s simply understanding the fact that almost everything is somewhat out of your control. With that wisdom, it’s only natural to help others, create, give back, and maneuver through life with a little less friction.

  • ‘Stick’, ‘Hole’, ‘Kangaroo’

    I moved to Canberra in 2020 and started to ride more often. I encouraged myself to join a cycling group who rode around a few loops every Friday morning at 6am. It was actually a bit of a challenge. Even as the guy at the back, you have a few jobs. Look and listen for approaching cars from the rear, especially larger, faster cars. Most importantly, you need to study and focus on the wheel a few inches in front of yours. Stick to it. Glue to it. Don’t touch it. Don’t kiss it.

    After a few rides I found myself at the front. When you sit at the front you take all the wind, and do a lot more ‘work’. That was fine with me. What was trickier was the focus. I had to focus. I had to shout out if there was a stick. I had to look for bad curbs, leaves, holes, cars, because I had a lot of guys behind me going 40km/h who need enough reaction time. A little less time thinking and more time looking. I would make some excuse and say I’m just nervous because I don’t know the route yet. If I knew the route off the top of my head, off by heart, or like the back of my hand, I could get back to thinking, rather than looking. I think the most likely time for someone to crash during a bike ride is likely when the front rider ‘rolls off’, allowing them to start thinking again.

    These distractions can also be feelings. I feel nervous when a car speeds by behind me. But do I need to feel that nervous? Do I need to hold onto much anger for the driver who was going just a little too fast? If I’m that angry about stuff like that, it’s fair to say my mind is not on the road.

    I also spent time learning to ride a track bike in the velodrome. Try daydreaming while your riding in a fixed gear with no brakes at 50km/h behind a motorbike!

    Terminal velocity

    Tom Pidcock puts his brain on ice during his descent of Mt Ventoux.

    “Consciousness deserts all processes where it can no longer be of use” William James, 1890

    “Accelerate through the corners” – Grandpa

    “I have no idea. I don’t know what my grip is called…It’s just all automatic. I don’t know how to explain it.” – Federer”

    “I have my mind inside the pectoral muscles when I do my bench press.” – Arnold Schwarzenegger redefining the word meathead.

    I’ve never been a great descender. My hands are gripped on the brakes. A few weeks ago, I crashed. I was taking a tight right turn and I slipped on the road. I was conscious of moving too quickly to the edge, feeling scared and out of control. I couldn’t move my bike. Brakes are a useful invention, but I was likely relying on them heavily as a crutch. Are you using your brakes to come to a controlled stop, or are they a bit more automatic? Have you simply built up too much speed?

    A pro cyclist on the other hand, has spent years training themselves to become one with the bike. Lance’s bike position looks like he has started melding his fingers with the bars. They put their faith in the machine, the road, their skills and go with the flow. When the descend, brakes are rarely on the agenda, more like an insurance policy or a killswitch. They are physically and mentally at ease with letting their bike reach something close to terminal velocity.

    Tadej Pogacar is furious with his brakes locking up, because now he’s forced to think about something he shouldn’t need to.

    If you are able to focus, you should see a reduction in judgements (both good and bad) and errors on the bike.

  • Riding without a chain

    Armstrong called it a “no chain” day – meaning he felt so strong that it seemed as if his bicycle had no chain.

    Before cycling I did CrossFit. I enjoyed the variety, learning the technical olympic lifts and the social aspects of ‘the Box’. But what got me coming back every week, sometimes trudging through the snow in sneakers and shorts was the ‘WOD’ (Workout of the Day). 15 minutes at the end of class: fast and intense and filled with suffering. At the start of the class we’d peer at the WOD that would be coming in 50 minutes. “Oh fuck, it’s ‘Helen‘, I hate pull-ups.” I loved them. I told myself I hated it and it was a chore, but it was something else. They gave me a measurable and simple way to sit with pain, discomfort, fear, stress. If I gritted my teeth and went balls to the wall, I could get some results on the board. But that was as much as I thought about it. WODs are hard, but I keep doing them.

    Once I started riding my bike more regularly, I was drawn to climbs. Which makes no sense really. I’m tall and heavy (90kg). Even if you’re pure muscle, cycling does not have time for weight. I used to watch old clips of Armstrong (doping aside) as a sort of inspirational figure to get me up those hills.

    In every different city I’ve lived in for the past few years, I’ve made a certain hill my enemy. I don’t always ride a bike this way, offensively, but on occasion I decide that what I need is a full on assault. I’m going to war. In Canberra, it was Mt Ainslie, a sharp, mean-spirited 1600m at 10.4%. I grew to love the climb and the challenge that left me feeling like I was seconds away from calling an ambulance. When I moved to San Francisco, which is a city of hills, I didn’t have a particular enemy but instead chose to fight all 20 of the steepest.

    I felt like Crossfit had massively improved my strength and cardio, and I was a strong cyclist, but perhaps the transfer was more about discomfort than anything to do with muscles.