-
You often see frequently asked questions like “am I too old to train parkour, I’m [insert any adult age here]?”.
Then you will also find the same question but instead of “old” they will ask “am I too fat (overweight), tall, weak” etc. etc. etc.
The short answer to all those questions is a resounding “no”! Or in other words:
You are never too old, fat, weak, geeky, whatever to start training parkour.
The long answer – as most people never believe you when it’s too simple – is …
-
When you lose your job, separate from your partner or simply get sick you may experience a lot of potential fears. I want to explain how to become fearless in times of uncertainty.
-
We live our life in transit always looking out for the imaginary point in the future when we will be happy. We overlook the actual place and time we are at. What would happen if we’d reversed that approach? Why not admit that the obstacle is the path?
-
Nobody would tell people how stupid and dangerous climbing mountains is these days. Yet just a century ago it was only done by a select few daredevils. Why do so many people think parkour is dangerous then? Is it really? Or rather good your health?
-
In case you have seen some good parkour/freerunning photos in the past you probably looked at Andy Day’s work. Andy has offered a parkour photography workshop in Berlin. That’s how I went about learning parkour photography.
-
The antidote to apathy and routine is parkour training. When you run, jump, climb you always are fully alert and focus on your surroundings. Like any kind of mindfulness you can expand your practice of parkour back to your daily life. Then it literally becomes moving meditation.
-
Can you only train parkour in “spots” of big cities? Of course not. It’s a matter of creativity. You need to embrace your surroundings and play with them.
The whole world is a playground. This also applies to life in general.
Parkour practice can help you with both.
-
Guess what, this “sedentary lifestyle” is what you should be afraid of – not simply the numerical aging as in becoming 30, 40, 50 years old or even older.
You can beat and defeat aging by not simply sitting down and letting your body rot.
A study comparing middle-aged and elderly people has proven it.
Some people sat all their life, others moved. You won’t believe what happened next!
-
Reading the bio’s of many well known parkour practitioners or freerunners you start wondering whether they were simply born for this and you weren’t.
Freerunners seem to have some superior genetic predisposition for scaling walls and jumping off roofs.
They obviously don’t have the genes for fear, weakness and laziness while they have the ones for
- agility
- flexibility
- strength
you lack it appears. Bullshit!