Exit the Cave

There’s something romantic about the Cave. About grinding away at something in private. About training with headphones on in our own little world. About stepping away for six months to emerge “unrecognizable” to all those people we imagine thinking about us. This masculine urge to “grind” seems to be gaining popularity. It reminds me of an incredible Under Armour ad for Michael Phelps’s iconic return to the 2016 Olympics which ended with the quote: “It’s what you do in the dark that puts you in the light.” Yet the Cave, despite its darkness of solitude and dampness from sweat and suffer-porn, is comfortable. It lets us tinker with our own delusions. If we spend too much time in the Cave, our pupils dilate, and our assumptions start to look like reality. That somehow this training regimen will unlock athletic prowess, or that our perfectly polished product will be loved by millions of users around the globe. I find Paramore playing in my head. “See, it’s easy to ignore trouble, when you’re living in a bubble.” Culture has created a cozy Cave. Smart devices reward private fitness. Recommendation algorithms propagate our preexisting philosophy through personalized programming. AI tells us what we want to hear and bolsters our assumptions instead of challenging them. We grow so comfortable curating our Cave that we forget the vast, interesting, beautiful, and brutal world beyond its walls. I say all this because I’ve spent years mistaking effort for progress. I learned this lesson nearly twenty years ago on a wrestling mat. “So, what are you gonna do, when the world don’t orbit around you?” As the cold winds off Lake Michigan blew snow over Kenowa Hills High School, two dozen young men grappled in a sweaty, windowless room. For four winters, I wrestled. I’d start the…