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Intentional suffering is the currency of progress

 A while back, I came across an amazing article from Mark Twight that read:

There's no such thing as a free lunch (TNSTAAFL).  

Link here to a current live version.

At any rate - I really loved that article.  For the past 5 years, when I go out for a run, somewhere in the first mile, I would remind myself, "I'm paying for my Lunch today".  It feels good to put money in your lunch fund.  

I've had a lot of conversations with myself over the utility of doing things you know are good for you, but you really don't want to do...  and I came up with this phrase (I'm pretty sure this is one of my original thoughts, but I could be mistaken):

Intentional Suffering is the currency of progress.

I've always enjoyed the idea of intentional suffering - suffering that you aren't required to do - as a path towards a better you.  If you really liked doing everything that made you better, it would be easy to progress.  If you are reading this - you are almost certainly far enough along in life that you already do things you enjoy doing.  So the delta between who you are and who you want to be isn't in "things you already like doing".  

Time to start banking some progress...  



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