Mona Lisa

Is it not what we strive for?

To progress?

To get better at what we do?

Yes, it is,
And we are only
going to get better,
And better,
And better.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not against progress. If I were, I’d still be trying to fit the triangle block into the square hole. But have we ever taken a step back, and wondered how fast we should progress?

If I phrased that correctly, only one question should be running through your mind.

“What’s wrong with progressing as fast as you can?”

The truth is, there’s nothing wrong, as long as you aren’t doing parkour.

If I phrased that correctly, only one thought should be running through your mind, or something else equally synonymous.

“Whaaaaaaaaaaaa?”

So here’s the truth. Parkour, is getting diluted.

“Parkour”, is not a drink.

For those of you who haven’t yet got to hear me rant, parkour is a movement art based around efficiency. The art originated from France, and its true form is still practiced in Lisses, France (pronounced “liss”). It was founded by a man named David Belle, who was inspired by his father; a fireman. It is an art that allows to you escape or reach anything within human limits, though it often makes you redefine what the limits are. It is an art that permits the fastest route from A to B, using only your body. It is an art, which is based around overcoming obstacles. It is an art, which permits the obstacle to define your technique. It is an art, of sheer precision. Quoting Thomas Couetdic, “Parkour may not actually be a discipline by itself, but it may simply be part of a bigger thing encompassing many others”.

Here’s another quote. “To be and to last”. Profound, but I didn’t come up with it. We’re not sure who did. It is what the parkour community echoes. Call it a mantra. Whatever. But hey, if I wanted to write about what parkour is or isn’t, I would. But that’s for another time.

When I say parkour is getting diluted, I refer to its essence. I refer that what it truly is. And why is parkour getting diluted?

Because it is spreading,

Too fast.

Often nowadays, a teenager will stumble across a video about “parkour” on YouTube, do a quick (not to mention almost always incomplete) lookup on Google, and go out running and jumping, hurtling himself at walls while calling himself a traceur (practitioner of parkour). For starters, nine out of ten videos on YouTube misrepresent parkour, or are of incredibly experienced traceurs. Secondly, most teenagers don’t bother to do proper research. They somehow feel like they’d make do for “less that satisfactory”. Thirdly, they are going to go out and do what they think is parkour, and further misrepresent it to others. Now remember that they didn’t do any proper research. So classically they’ll do big jumps, huge drops, and anything they think will impress their peers, without first building up their bodies, and they’ll do it with horrible technique. Not that technique would help much if your body wasn’t strong enough. And they’d butcher the term “traceur”. Oh, and parkour wasn’t invented to impress. Now I could go on and lecture about the whole anti-competition thing, but then I’d never stop.

So have you got a hint about what I meant by “dilution”?

It’s spreading too fast, and it’s losing its’ essence.

But back to the topic (speedy progression). Let us assume the role of that teenager. But for our sake, make him sliiiiiiiiiiiiightly more matured, and lucky. Let’s say he sees a proper video. And let’s say he does some solid research. But, not enough. I know I didn’t do enough research until I broke my arm. Due to a delayed union, it caused me six months of deep thinking and extensive research. My dad calls is soul searching. I call it chronic boredom put to productive use. But back to the teen I liken my past self to.

He’ll do some strength training, but work largely on his technique. Due to the wealth of knowledge online, he’ll progress. He’ll progress fast. By two months he’ll be doing things that other people, training properly for over a year, wouldn’t dare do. And what’s the problem with that? The problem is that he should be strengthening his body, not doing death defying things. He can do them, yes. But he is unwittingly slowly destroying his body. I can say confidently that most people are not strong enough to start parkour with no strength training. By most, I include rock climbers, bikers, and marathon runners. That, is simply how physically demanding it is.

Because the many common techniques are already listed online, it makes it simple to learn something new. Too simple.

Let’s look at David Belle and the people he originally trained with. Why is it that they can take 30 feet drops without breaking their legs? It is because the original traceurs didn’t have the luxury of knowledge. They were out there day by day, finding new movements, rediscovering old ones, and siphoning away inefficiencies. As a result, through the many trials and errors, they developed strong bodies. Strong enough to consistently take 30 feet drops. Unlike the hypothetical but unfortunately common teenager.

So one day he’ll wake up, give his “traceur” buddies a call, and they’ll head out doing whatever their misinterpretation of parkour looks like. And he’ll feel the now becoming common pain in his joints, get worse. And by 25, he’ll have arthritis in his knees and ankles.

That, is what is wrong about progressing too fast.

And I take it back. It’s not only when your doing parkour.

It applies to everything.

When we progress too fast, we can become disillusioned.

Wouldn’t it be great to have a church that grew and grew and grew at an almost alarming rate? To simply put it, no. (For those of you who don’t know I’m a Christian, I’m a Christian) When a church grows too fast, the community does not have time to form a firm bond. It does not have time to become closely knitted. It just grows on and becomes something hollow. And while everyone is marveling and focusing on the growth, the church may (hypothetically) even lose sight of its mission. It just grows. The ideal church growth model would have the church growing in cycles. Grow, bond, grow, bond. And every now and then they should reassess their mission to see whether it aligns itself with Jesus’ mission, lest they veer off course.

When we progress too fast, we become so caught up in the progressing, that we lose sight of why we want to.

“Study harder la! Don’t you want to get good results? Study hard!” yells the mother. Sound familiar? So the student studies hard. He dedicates his life to it. Day and night, he studies. And gets phenomenal results. He then proceeds to repeat the cycle the next semester, and eventually gets incredibly fed up and frustrated. Why? Because he knows he is studying for his future, but has never taken much time to think what he wants for it.

So for those of you who have progressed incredibly far, for those who feel like they lack sight or direction, and for those who no longer know why they continue running…

Take a step back and look at the bigger picture.

There, I said it. The missing link between the title and the post.

When Leonardo da Vinci was painting the Mona Lisa, do you think he dedicated all his focus onto one spot of her/his smile without taking into account the whole lips, in reference to the face he was painting? Do you think he spent all his time painting methodically with his nose two inches from the canvas? No. Occasionally, he would take a step back and see how his masterpiece was taking shape.

So that’s what we should all do from time to time. Take a step back, and look at where we are heading. Also, take your own step back, or eventually something will come along and shove you and it’ll make you stumble further backwards than you can handle. And you’ll fall on your butt. Then you’ll have to go through the trouble of standing up again, learning to trust your feet, and before diving back into whatever you were doing, hopefully you’ll get a glimpse of the bigger picture. For me my little wake up call was breaking my arm. Okay maybe it wasn’t so little but I thank God for it. It gave me a nice six month long look at the bigger picture so that when I was ready, I had a direction to head in, and that direction has kept me these seven months.

So take a step back, or it’ll be taken for you. Why not do it voluntarily? Take the step back, so that you have a direction to head towards, and you’ll be able to progress with a purpose, and above all else, progress steadily.

Is it not what we should all strive for?

To progress steadily?