A Matter Of Perspective


8:00 and 10:00 only

No one person experiences or interprets an event exactly the same as the next person. Two people may see the same event unfold, but the vantage point from which it is seen can have a major influence in how it is ultimately perceived. Our proclivity for subjectivity often leads us to see events through our own interpretation - or our minds' eye - not as how they look to others. Philosophers call this cognitive process "a priori", or knowledge before, and it can confuse our relationship with reality - the world in which we experience everyday.

As we grow older we become more resistant to change. Our thoughts, beliefs and our very bodies emulsify like oil-in-water - isolated from different ways of thinking. Our leisure time is consolidated around people of similar kind. Our curiosity, a foible of youth, wanes. We become less receptive to new ideas. We tend to hold more and more assumptions about reality that we take as certainties. Anything that begins to challenge these certainties is perceived as a threat and must be confronted. (You see this in politics all the time.) Understood in this context, the whole notion of truth becomes a highly subjective issue. We often think of truth as something to be hashed out on the debate stage, deliberated in the court room, or resolved over family dinner. Yet seeking objective, unadulterated truth isn't found by winning arguments. It starts by questioning yourself; by challenging those long established and most unimpeachable beliefs. This can be an extremely frustrating, uncomfortable, and seemingly futile process - that's why so few do it. No one likes to be wrong. But questioning yourself can be a humbling, liberating, and noble undertaking. It can open up new windows, allowing you to see and understand reality in new ways. You will soon see that your mind holds multiple assumptions, but the world is made up of multiple realities, for every mind perceives the world differently.

The CrossFit box would seem like one of the last places where such issues arise. But look more closely. Are you a different person now, a more well-rounded individual, than when you first came to CFSC? In what way? How have your relationships changed with the people you train with? How has your understanding of self changed? And what does this change say about CrossFit and, more importantly, you?

- Dahlberg


Complete as many reps in 20 minutes as you can of:
Rope Climb
Bench Press; body weight
