Effortless effort - wu-wei

Effortless effort, wu-wei (non-forcing), is achieved when "unnecessary" physical tension and mental resistance are eliminated.

At last Saturday's meeting, Sifu once again mentioned that when we achieve effortless effort in our training or on our journey, we become complacent, and it is time to adjust, because the comfort of effortlessness is the enemy of mastery.

This stayed with me for a while, and I had a lot of thoughts that seemed to contradict each other. Unfortunately, my schedule didn't allow me to dig into this paradox, and I'm not so sure I can pick up on my train of thought again, but I'll try.

The first thing that popped into my head was how effortless it felt at the beginning of the year and several times in the first few months. Not necessarily continuous, like every day or every push-up, but in hindsight, that first period seemed effortless in comparison to now.

I couldn't help but think how ironic it is that I seem to be going backward. Then I wondered if this was indeed so effortless, as some days I even doubled my required numbers, did I even do enough? 

Of course, I realize this is merely a perception I have in hindsight, and it's romanticized rather than a realistic evaluation of how much effort it took to do the work back then. 

When I think of it in terms of mental vs. physical effort, I realize the two don't always align.

On the one hand, I can now do a few more push-ups in one set (it doesn't feel effortless when I squeeze these last few out, but I realize I can do more before it becomes a real effort. On the other hand, the mental effort became harder, not easier. It takes a lot more effort now to do my minimum daily push-ups and sit-ups, even though they have become physically easier. 

The other thing about effort is it's not a linear curve. The effort required to meet the same daily requirements can fluctuate widely and is influenced by a range of internal and external factors, including environmental, health, age, and safety conditions.

Chatting with Todai Ferris the other day about changing her push-up routine also highlighted that we are all fighting different types of resistance. I initially panicked when she told me about her new approach because it sounded like something I had tried and it became an issue for me.  Knowing a bit of our history, I can see though how different our struggles are. I'm in battle with my mental resistance of getting 50.000 repetitions done. She, on the other hand, has already achieved this. She is not fighting the mental strain right now; she is battling the physical resistance of full push-up repetitions. While we are on the same path, we are fighting different battles. 

And then again, my struggles today are different than the ones tomorrow or yesterday.

Looping back now to the beginning of my blog and the beginning of my year, it wasn't, in fact, effortless effort then either. My push-ups definitely weren't any easier. I just didn't battle the thing then that is my biggest challenge right now.