Philosophy of Parkour

I first learned of parkour around 2012. I thought it was so cool, but I was too scared to even start. All the videos I saw were these crazy jumps at height or doing flips over concrete. It took me eight years to finally practice it myself, and I have learned so much from my experiences.

Parkour is such a unique and interesting sport because it is individualistic, creative, and physically demanding. At its core, parkour is about overcoming physical and mental obstacles. This is the philosophy of parkour that I have come to know. It is a progression of physically building the strength to overcome obstacles, then mentally overcoming your fears about movements you know you can physically do. It’s immensely personal, and it grows your relationship with yourself in a way I never thought a sport could. And because it is so individualistic, parkour is inherently creative. Every personal challenge is created directly by you.

I think I appreciate parkour so much because its philosophy is applicable to other parts of life. You take a challenge and break it down into easier pieces. You practice each piece, then gradually put it all back together. By overcoming the smaller, easier parts in isolation, you are achieving your larger goal. This way of thinking teaches you a few things: what you are good at, what scares you, and that you are capable of great things.

Finally, parkour teaches you that failure is part of the journey. I have another post about failure where I briefly mention parkour, but the idea is that you probably will not overcome an obstacle on the first try. Or you may not be strong enough to do a certain movement yet. Neither of these situations are bad, in fact, most of the gratification of overcoming obstacles comes from the work you had to put in to achieve it.

All that being said, of course you do not have to do parkour to think this way! My experience with the sport has taught me how to overcome obstacles, mental blocks, and achieve large goals. While I do believe that parkour is great and fun exercise, I know it is not for everyone. Parkour, the philosophy, however, applies much more broadly, and anyone can learn the lessons from this discipline.