After reading It's Not About the Bike, My Journey Back To Life, by Lance Armstrong, I realized that it's not about the bike, as the title of the book states. I realized that there were many life lessons discussed in his autobiography that do not have anything to do with bicycling, even though this is what he is famous for.
One life lesson that I think is displayed in the book is practical. It is discussed on PG: 5 of Lance Armstrong's autobiography.
"Of course I should have known that something was wrong with me. But athletes, especially cyclists, are in the business of denial. You deny all the aches and pains because you have to in order to finish the race. It's a sport of self-abuse. You"re on your bike for the whole day, six and seven hours, in all kinds of weather and conditions, over cobblestones and gravel, in mud and wind and rain, and even hail, and you do not give into pain.
"Everything hurts. Your back hurts, your feet hurt, your hands hurt, your neck hurts, your legs hurt, and of course, your butt hurts.
"So no, I didn't pay attention to the fact that I didn't feel well in 1996. When my right testicle became slightly swollen that winter, I told myself to live with it, because I assumed it was something I had done to myself on the bike, or that my system was compensating for some physiological male thing. I was riding strong, as well as I ever had, actually, and there was no reason to stop.".
From this passage, Lance acknowledges that he waited too long to go to a doctor. Maybe if he had listened to his body the first time he saw signs of unhealthiness, his cancer would not have progressed so much. I think this life lesson that he learned is that nothing is more precious than life. He realized this later in the book too. The bike does not mean ANYTHING, if he is not alive to ride it.
The next life lesson that I think Lance learned is something his mother told him when he was 16. On PG: 29 of the autobiography it is discussed.
