bukowski was a joke.
made a career of self loathing and claiming to hate society but was the biggest attention whore going.
I think everyone who trains seriously has some kind of mental issue, a disorder or disorders etc. some are more extreme than others.
everybody dies. the reaper comes for us all. I'd rather abuse the shit out of my body, lived a glorious life at redline and die young than grind out the last years of my life in an old age home wishing I had have done things differently.
Bukowski is like a god to me. Absolutely love him more than I can say, I have everything he has written pretty much and read it regularly. "Van Bilderass" comes from a Bukowski story. He loved life but also saw the impossible contradictions and problems with living. He really comes across as genuine to me, the most important quality a person can have imo.
It was kind of silly to paste that pic in this thread, was just reminded of that quote.
Your last paragraph, well I kind of agree, but then you can't be critical of, for example, the self-destructive drug use of guys in this bodybuilding lifestyle. Piana guaranteed has a lot of self-loathing in him, what he's doing is crazy dangerous, far beyond the risks of any hormone use. Injecting plastics and glass everywhere in your body, muscles, lips, ass, everything. When he has to downsize that's going to look ridiculous... that's why I think he figures he will be dead by that time.
That quote may be taken out of context when applied to Pianis drug abuse.
A few other good Bukowski quotes:
“If you’re going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don’t even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery–isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you’ll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you’re going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It’s the only good fight there is.”
“We’re all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn’t. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing. ”
Absolutely beautiful, I have shivers reading this shit.
