You have to stop treating it like a performance where you are trying to become the best version of yourself. It is not theatre. It is not self transformation day after day. You do it the way you brush your teeth. It is not about liking or disliking it. It is simply something you do.
The moment you frame working out as a heroic arc, you introduce emotion into it. Motivation, inspiration, identity, self judgment. That makes it unstable. Some days you will feel like the protagonist. Most days you will not.
But brushing your teeth requires no identity. No inspiration. No self analysis.
It is maintenance. When exercise becomes maintenance rather than self-improvement theatre, it becomes lighter. Less ego. Less pressure. Less evaluation.
Something very Erotic about this.
The metal becomes a second skin, the implication that the rough and volatile nature is an intimate one meant to be hidden, concealed.