We’ve all heard the saying, “Use it or lose it.” The familiar proverb embodies one of the most important principles of human nature: To become proficient in any field, you must practice. However, we tend to think of this maxim in terms of our bodies. For example, if I place your right arm in a cast for three months, it will atrophy to almost nothing by the time the cast is removed. Only months of regular exercise will restore it to normalcy. As we grow older and our lives become more sedentary, we cease to put regular older and our lives become more sedentary, we cease to put regular strain on our muscles. As a result, our bodies become soft and fragile.

We lose our physical conditioning through failure to use our muscles, and as a consequence we are easy prey for sickness and disease. Regular and systematic use of our bodies prevents such deterioration.”If some people didn’t lift their eyebrows,” jokes Lee Haney, Mr. Olympia, “they would never get any exercise.” Becoming “busy body” has its advantages.

So, too, with the more intangible parts of our nature. We must use our courage, or it deserts us; we must use our determination, or it leaves us; we must exercise our power of decision, or we soon find that we have none. To achieve a standard of excellence, to accomplish anything extraordinary, we must be disciplined and willing to devote long hours to the task at hand. It means using both our physical and our mental muscles in order to reach our objective. Each of us best fulfills our destiny when we operate full blast, when we are fully extended.