Building Bodies

to Talal Nizameddin

It’s my gym-versary. 

As of today, I’ve officially been gymming for 6 months. 

For those of you wondering how I have the time: I don’t. 

I remember being sportive my whole life having done Ballet for 12 years, Taekwondo for 4 years, Rhythmic Gymnastics for 4 years, and Yoga for 2 years. 

Then academia “happened”. And I quit. 

It most certainly was not a decision I was happy about; rather one I felt had to be made given that as I grew older, my studies demanded more of my time and concentration. It seemed simple: The more pressured I was, the more nervous I became, so working on “fixing” my body had to come second to everything else. There was simply no time.

It wasn’t until recently, and after quite a good deal of introspection and a heartfelt conversation I had with a caring friend, that I came to the harsh realization that happiness and/or success is a choice. I could not possibly dream of having my former active lifestyle and expect to be happy and fit if I wasn’t going to do anything to purposefully invoke a change and make it happen. 

So I joined a gym. With my hectic part-time schedule, that meant that after waking up at 6am, teaching at 3 universities, driving for 3 hours, and arriving home by 8pm, I would pack my gym bag, and be at the gym by 8.30pm after which I would train for an hour, shower, and be in bed by 11pm. This cycle would repeat itself 6 times, as I would train weights/lifting 3 times a week, and cardio another 3 times a week.

Most colleagues thought I was losing my mind. Others simply felt pity for me as they thought I was working myself too hard, that the rigorous schedule was unnecessary, and that my body looked “okay” without it. 

As a slightly obsessive-compulsive pattern-observer, the irony didn’t escape me: Fellow colleagues (English Instructors) were telling me that my “body” was “fine” and that there was no need to “fix” it. The analogy was too great for me to overlook. I started wondering: Why is it that we often succumb to our lethargic instincts and settle for “okay” when we know with that bit of extra “toning”, the artifact in process could turn out to be a masterful work of art?

Personally, any pieces of writing of mine (especially my poems) are ones I set aside for weeks and weeks before I revisit them again and consider sending them out for publication. Sometimes, I revise for language; other times I discard an idea altogether. Sometimes I find the trail I was on to be leading me nowhere, and on other rare days, I challenge myself and add more research/data/imagery that I can never be entirely sure I can handle at the time, but would love to see myself experimenting with anyway. 

When I started training at the gym, I could barely lift 1kg and run for 2 minutes nonstop. I would strain myself all the time as my muscles hadn’t been worked in a while.

When I first started writing, all my poems were abstract nursery rhymes, and my research was a chaotic conversational collage, as opposed to a structured sequenced synthesis. My mind would often freeze as I’d heavy-heartedly lament my inevitable writer’s block.

I now lift 16kg, can run for 60 minutes nonstop (which adds up to a total of 25km / a week) – and I’m still training.

I now write free-verse and prose, publish for the sheer pleasure of sharing my poetry, and engage in academic research for the simple pleasure of learning more, engaging in hermeneutic discussions, and promoting civic engagement – and I’m still writing. 

I’ve observed that our culture has become too accustomed to investing in “quick-fixes” that we have forgotten that one of the greatest rewards in life is enjoying the drafting process; making the simple decision that to be happy, to be successful, something must be done. 

For me, some days that meant going to the Writing Center, and other days, it meant consulting my gym coach. Although, even to date, I still consider neither myself, nor my writings -- by any means -- a complete draft. 

After all, a muscle is only as strong as you repeatedly train it, so one thing is certain: The gym gloves and notepad are here to stay.