by Graham Averill

"Slogans like 'go big or go home's; are nothing more than propaganda, and at the end of the day, propaganda has one purpose: to get rational people to do irrational things-like vote for Bush twice."

“Go big or go home.” I heard this phrase a hundred times at a recent 24-hour mountain bike race. It implies, of course, that if you’re not pushing the limits of your pain/skill threshold with every pedal, if you’re not testing the full travel capacity of your fork, if you’re not tying a tourniquet to the blown artery in your leg so you can go one more lap, then you may as well be at home watching figure skating with a bag of chips on your lap. If you’re not busting capillaries from exertion, then what’s the point, right?

Never mind the fact that just participating in a 24-hour mountain bike race would have been considered cutting edge five years ago. Now it’s mundane. “You do 24-hour mountain bike races? Yeah? So does my grandma.” It’s not enough to just participate in the race, you’ve got to crack ammonia tubes under your nose and ride naked.

Go big or go home: It’s a seductive phrase. Who among us doesn’t want to go big? Who shows up at the trailhead thinking, “I’m gonna pedal easy, walk the hills, max out my brakes on the downhills, then maybe take a nap around mile three?”

Nobody wants to be a lightweight, so it’s easy to get sucked into the go-big mindset. But beware of slogans. As a general rule, the catchier the slogan, the more dangerous it is. Take “Better dead than Red,” a popular chant during the cold war. It’s so catchy you can dance to it, and millions of Americans did, but really? You’d rather be dead than a communist? Or how about Nike’s famous motto: “Just do it.” Nobody likes acting without considering the consequences more than me, but these happen to be the exact words a friend of mine said before dabbling in snake handling. May he rest in peace.

It helps to look at the people screaming the slogan in order to gauge the slogan’s inherent danger. Take, “no pain, no gain,” for instance. An entire generation was raised with this slogan stenciled to their high school gym locker rooms. After all, sports injuries among baby boomers increased by 30 percent in the ‘90s. Why? Because some of us think the snapping of tendons and loss of knee cartilage is good for us. The biggest fan of the “no pain, no gain” slogan is a guy at my gym who repeats this expression while slapping himself in the face in front of the mirror.

At the heart of these slogans is a demographic that refuses to grow up. Just look at the attendees of 24-hour mountain bike races. The majority of participants are thirty-something men (yes, this is a male epidemic. Women are too smart to fall for slogans.) They are professionals with businesses and responsibilities, people who could feasibly run for office…and win. Yet, there they are, riding bikes-a pastime indicative of childhood freedom-staying up all night, crushing beer cans on their helmets.

The only problem is we’re not made for this sort of sustained “bigness.” Forget our wilting bodies that begin to shut down and need constant reconstructive surgery after the age of 28. I’m talking about our day-to-day lives. The businesses we run, the kids we feed, the spouses that depend on us; this sort of life is not made for seizing the day. In high school, it’s perfectly okay to “go big.” Go ahead, test your mortality. Snap that femur in two by trying to free-climb Mount Yonah on acid. That’s what being a kid is all about. The only thing you’re going to miss out on as a 17-year old laid up with a broken leg is a math test and a chance to make out with the cheerleader. Break a leg as an adult and there’s hell to pay. Because you’ve got work tomorrow. And your wife has been asking to take ballroom dance lessons. And the house needs a fresh coat of paint. And your boss is expecting a bump in sales from your territory. Get the picture? I’m talking about responsibility here, something that previous generations understood. But not us. We’ve been trying to avoid the dreaded “R” word by riding our bikes as much as possible.

So for the sake of our careers and families, we have to rewire ourselves. We have to be reprogrammed to forget the catchy slogans of our youth and embrace responsibility. We have to stop thinking that “going big” or “going home” are the only two viable options. There’s a wonderful middle ground in there ripe for exploring. We don’t have to go big every time we go outside. Don’t overlook the understated adventure. The underhyped outing. Something, like say, riding your bike in the woods...without testing the impact threshold of your helmet. Or going for a jog and stopping when you get tired. Or paddling a lazy class II river.

There’s nothing wrong with knowing your limits and taking it easy in the woods. Because slogans like “go big or go home” are nothing more than propaganda, and at the end of the day, propaganda has one purpose: to get rational people to do irrational things…like vote for Bush…twice.

So forget going big. And remember what Aristotle said about moderation being the key to happiness. Then again, “Try your hardest, but keep it within reason and remember that you have to be presentable the next day for work” doesn’t have the same ring to it.