At one time, I ran a blog called Fitterverse: A universe of fitness. This post originally appeared there. Thanks to the Wayback Machine, I’ve been able to recapture the text. I’ve published them here on their original publication dates.
I’m rehabbing an injury. Tennis elbow, to be exact, but that’s not important. What is important is the effect on my ability to lift. At this phase of my rehabilitation, I’m lifting extremely light, and focusing on negative reps.
Ego is a big part of the human psyche. The things to which you tie your ego are up to you. In the gym many of us, particularly men, tie our ego to how many plates are on the bar. Being unable to load up that bar gives you a different perspective.
It’s hard not to be judgmental. While I try not to indulge that part of my personality, I still find myself looking at guys who are lifting half of what I can do and thinking less of them. I try to banish those thoughts because it wasn’t that long ago I was right there with them. Now I’m lifting less than they are.
This change in perspective has resulted in introspection. The main point: your manhood is not measured by the weight on the bar. As an extension, lifting more weight doesn’t make your penis bigger – which has nothing to do with your manhood, either.
So what does make a man? I’ve often thought of some of these traits:
- Strength. Wait a second! Didn’t I just say that how much you lift isn’t a measure of manhood? Yes, I did. There are many kinds of strength. While there’s value to being physically strong, it’s not the only thing. There’s the emotional strength to be a good parent, strength of character to do the right thing, moral strength to respect others. These are the strengths that make a man.
- Courage. Courage isn’t about being unafraid. Courage is about facing your fear and taking action anyway.
- Shakespeare says this one best in Sonnet 94: They that have power to hurt and will do none.
The more I looked at those, the more I realized that they’re not the traits of a great man – they’re the traits of a great person. We should all be strong, courageous, and willing to do the right thing. We should all control our personal power to hurt. Many of the things put on “manhood” really are just “personhood.”
A lot of other bullshit gets tied to manhood. Ability at sports. Ability to fix things or build things. The ability to lift heavy objects. Violence and aggression. Owning a gun or a pickup truck. None of this stuff matters.
So what really matters here? I did some googling, and came up with a great article from a transgender person searching for a male identity. A quick quote therefrom:
Every man I’ve known well enough to get a little drunk with has eventually addressed the dilemma: how to be yourself in a world that expects a monster or a hero, but never a new dad struggling with how to raise his own child under the weight of a bad relationship to his own father, or an effeminate straight man struggling to accept himself for who he is when his own family can’t believe he’s not gay.
This unique perspective helped encapsulate the issue. Manhood isn’t what other people think of you – it’s how you think of yourself, and how you respond to the hand you’ve been dealt. Nothing more. Certainly nothing to do with the weight on the bar.