Two Superhumans, Two Large Boulders, and a Long Waiting Time
An unexpected takeaway on acceptance from Netflix’s brutal and uplifting “Physical:100”
The registration staff accepted my request to fill a doctor’s prescription for an infirm family member.
She then handed me a queue ticket for collecting the medication and helpfully added: “The waiting time is around 1 hour.”
I didn’t find the long waiting time surprising — I could see there were more than 40 people in the waiting area.
What I found surprising was the absence of annoyance upon hearing about the 1-hour wait.
Because you see, I had already been queuing for 40 minutes just to speak to the registration staff.
These unbidden thoughts immediately popped into my head after hearing about the estimated waiting time:
If those two contestants in “Physical:100” managed to stand in place for as long as they did while holding up massive boulders on their shoulders, I can wait around in a hospital pharmacy for a whole hour.
And without a massive boulder on my shoulder.
No problem there.
My brain pulled off a slick re-framing of perspective there.
It compared my impending task of waiting for one more hour at the hospital pharmacy to the extraordinary punishment two contestants endured in Netflix’s Physical:100.
Through this lens of comparison, any physical or emotional discomfort that may arise from my waiting task appear negligible and even laughable.
That made acceptance of my task easy.
No annoyance, no frustration, no “Why me?” mentality, and no blaming.
I appreciated that oasis of inner peace as I waited in a crowded hospital pharmacy for another 1 hour and 20 min before my queue number was finally called.
Yes, that lady was off with her time estimate but you know what, that’s okay.
Acceptance is a powerful antidote to emotional discomfort.
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) — known to be effective for people who struggle with tolerating and regulating their emotions — promotes radical acceptance as one of several distress tolerance skills.
What is radical acceptance? It involves observing what’s going on without judging and accepting the situation without needing to change anything. A helpful mantra for radical acceptance is:
It is what it is.
I also find this quote by the Stoic philosopher Epictetus helpful whenever I face challenging situations that keep me up at night and make me feel hot and bothered while awake:
Don’t seek to have events happen as you wish, but wish them to happen as they do happen, and all will be well with you.
Epictetus’s approach is pretty much radical acceptance on steroids. Instead of telling ourselves the situation is what it is, we are telling ourselves the situation is what we want. Counter-intuitive but powerful.
When you truly accept your situation, you will find yourself shedding some emotional baggage on the spot. And your footsteps will feel lighter as you continue walking on your life journey.
I would be remiss if I did not plug for Physical:100 here. I think it was half the reason I wrote this story.
Physical:100 is a Korean reality show touted to be a cross between Squid Game — without the lethality — and Survivor.
It’s possibly my favorite reality show to date. (Or maybe I’m just falling prey to the recency effect.)
The contestants’ behaviors were unscripted and there was minimal interpersonal drama —refreshing for a reality show.
Mutual respect, perseverance, sporting excellence, and personal sacrifices were recurring themes as 100 contestants competed with each other in innovative individual and team quests.
Throw in inspiring underdog stories, impeccable sportsmanship, and eye candy for those who like them jacked and shredded, and we have an exhilarating reality show that is likely to spawn copycats over the next 2 years.
When writing this story, I searched for existing Medium stories on Physical:100 and could only find two stories that were written in English.
Celeste Elle and Konstantinos are clearly also fans of Physical:100. I’ll let them persuade you to watch the show if you are still on the fence.
Thank you for reading.
