‘I'm a savage': An exercise in human potential or self-harm?

Sydney Morning Herald

3 days ago

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Yet, Goggins would also reveal he had pushed himself so hard he had blood in his urine, and left his body with so many health issues it had 'pretty much shut down on me'.
A celebration of human potential, or self harm?
Achieving what once seemed impossible stretches our perspective on life and by challenging our bodies, we challenge our beliefs about ourselves. Through suffering, the theory goes, we can cultivate gratitude and build tolerance for life's day-to-day stresses.
But when are we celebrating human potential, and when are we elevating self-harm? What is the line between transcending our beliefs about what we're capable of and self-destruction?
The answer depends on who you ask.
Olympic marathon runner, Jess Stenson has an intimate relationship with suffering through her sport.
'Pain shows up in a lot of different ways,' says the 37-year-old Commonwealth Games gold medallist. 'It can be mental suffering – feeling overwhelmed or anxious, or I have self-doubt – or it can be physical pain.'
She accepts that to achieve her potential, she has to push through mental pain and some physical pain, including blisters, chafing and cramps.
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At the 37 kilometre mark of the 2018 Commonwealth Games marathon in the Gold Coast, however, Stenson started feeling dizzy, disorientated, and began shivering.
'This might be a bit dangerous,' the lululemon athlete recalls thinking.
Nauseous and vague about where she was, Stenson, now a mother of two, finished the race in third place, but had taken her body to a place she won't go again: 'That was before becoming a parent, but now even more so, I have my health to think about so I can look after the people around me. You've got to know your risk versus your reward.'
The 'risk versus reward' is different for Chris Turnbull, whose 2023 record for the fastest transcontinental run across Australia was broken by Goodge.
Driven by curiosity about where different adventures take him in body and mind, he isn't averse to dizziness and disorientation.
'No, I love that too,' says the 41-year-old Sydneysider. 'That's another experience.'
But, like Stenson, long-term health is a consideration.
'Whether there's going to be permanent physical or mental damage I think is a clear line,' says Turnbull, a civil engineer by trade and father of two.
While he admits it can be difficult to tell in the midst of an extreme challenge if any harm is temporary or not, he believes we can do much more than we think without hurting ourselves permanently.
His curiosity once motivated him to work for 24 hours, just to see if he could operate mentally for that long; to choose to run during peak rain so he can splash through puddles and see the dam levels near where he lives; to run for 31 hours continuously (and 208 kilometres) in the Backyard Ultra event last month; and, of course, to run across Australia.
It took him six months to recover from his transcontinental run. During the recovery, he suffered exhaustion and nerve issues which caused dizziness and tingles to shoot up his legs when he tried to run, 'but it went away'.
'I feel almost like a collector of experiences now,' he says, adding that they override the 'small discomfort' of the pain.
'Today there is very, very little that we need to do that causes us discomfort in life,' says Turnbull. 'It's up to us then if we want to do anything hard, which will often come with personal growth and unlock some new perspective in your mind.'
The line between transcendence and self-harm
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Honorary professor Kieran Fallon, the former medical director of the Sydney to Melbourne ultramarathon and head of sports medicine at the Australian Institute of Sport, largely agrees with Turnbull that it's challenging to cause permanent damage.
'Overall there's not a great deal of data on each bodily system, but there is some, and it indicates that it doesn't really cause that much trouble long-term,' says Fallon, now at Australian National University.
Some endurance athletes are more likely to get cardiac fibrosis which can lead to cardiac rhythm disturbances, and there is an increased risk of malignant skin cancer from being out in the sun as well as osteoarthritis in the knees and hips. Issues with the nerves and tendons are common, but typically resolve if the person gives them time to recover.
Female endurance athletes need to be wary of relative energy deficiency in sport (REDs), which can affect fertility and overall health and performance. Otherwise, Fallon says that unless a person has a specific, rare problem like rhabdomyolysis (severe muscle breakdown), and acute renal failure, most issues are temporary.
Dr Zena Burgess, CEO of The Australian Psychological Society, says there is much to be celebrated in the kinds of endurance feats that also involve some suffering and that positive addictions are, well, positive.
'Building mental resilience, having pain tolerance, setting goals and having coping strategies – all of that is fantastic,' says Burgess, an ocean swimmer who has participated in triathlons.
It becomes destructive, she says, if a person can't ever stop, when the relentless pursuit becomes more important than anything else in their life, when it defines their self-worth and when they no longer listen to their bodies.
She doesn't revere someone running 400 kilometres on a broken foot, as one US ultra-runner spoke about in April.
'I'd be celebrating the person who stopped and actually got treatment and then went back to train and was motivated again,' she says. 'The resilience of being able to keep trying, not just causing damage to your body and dealing with suffering.'
For Goodge, the lines between constructive and destructive are nebulous, perhaps because both can exist at the same time.
'I always played rugby and, honestly, when I was a kid I wasn't very good at it,' says the Cadence hydration-sponsored athlete over the phone. 'At one point my Dad just said, 'Do you want to go fishing instead?''
At some point, however, he realised that he might not be the most skilled player, but he could be the most dogged. It was a mindset that led to a semi-professional rugby career, something he never thought possible, and to pursue running in his grief after his mother died from non-Hodgkins lymphoma in 2018.
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The same bullish mentality is what propelled him towards 'powerful and profound experiences' including running across Australia.
'It is extreme, and it is self-destructive, but that's kind of why I lean in to it,' he says.
If his body doesn't recover from brutal challenges he puts it through, he will turn his attention to the other pursuits he's passionate about, in fashion and business.
'When I lock in, I lock in hard but outside of that I'm just conscious of enjoying life to the max. Life is finite,' Goodge says.