The title of the 2004 movie Million Dollar Baby is said to originate from the lyrics of a 1970s song, which describe finding something worth more than a million dollars in a five-and-dime store. It means discovering a rare treasure in an unexpected place or meeting someone precious by chance. In the movie Million Dollar Baby, this precious person is expressed in Irish as “Mokulsha! My darling, my blood!”
Frankie (Clint Eastwood) is an old boxing trainer nearing retirement, managing a rundown gym with his only friend, Scrap (Morgan Freeman), a retired boxer. They live amusingly, bickering with each other. One day, a female aspiring boxer named Maggie (Hilary Swank) visits the gym. Frankie coldly sends her away, saying a 31-year-old woman shouldn’t dream of becoming a boxer just as one shouldn’t dream of becoming a ballerina. However, Maggie, whose only hope is boxing, continues to train alone at the gym every day. Eventually, impressed by her persistence, Frankie agrees to become her trainer.
Frankie is a stubborn trainer who lives by principles. His first principle is “Protect myself at all times.” Another principle is that the athlete he trains has only two choices: obey him or leave. However, Maggie questions and understands the reasons behind the training before repeatedly practicing. Frankie teaches Maggie the basics of footwork step by step, like “weight on the right foot if the left hand moves,” similar to a father caring for his child. Success comes naturally to those who train relentlessly, trusting their trainer like a father, until Maggie is fatally struck by an illegal blow during the championship match. Maggie failed to adhere to Frankie’s primary principle, “Protect myself at all times.”
While Frankie trains Maggie, Scrap silently supports them from a distance, muttering, “To make a fighter, you have to strip them down to bare wood. You can’t just tell them to forget everything they know; you have to make them forget even their bones. Make them so tired that they only listen to you, only hear your voice, and only do what you say and nothing else.” When Scrap says, “forget it to the bone,” he likely means erasing it from the unconscious, as our bones have no memory device. Golf instructors often tell students to practice the same swing repeatedly until their muscles remember it. But can practice really turn people into consistent swing machines? Some believe this and tirelessly swing their clubs. However, research from Stanford University published in late 2006 suggests that such efforts are often a waste of time. According to the research published in the journal Neuron (December 20, 2006), no amount of practice can maintain a consistent golf swing, as brain function influences the swing far more than muscle memory.
Muscles are strengthened through practice, but they don’t retain memory. Practice helps when our brain finds the most suitable swing information during the process. In other words, rigorous practice is beneficial only when done thoughtfully. The results of such thoughts are stored in our brains and can be retrieved when necessary, instinctively, as Frankie suggests. Instinctive also means resolving things unconsciously.
Much of our life relies on the unconscious. The concept of the unconscious was introduced in the early 1880s by Austrian neurologist and psychoanalysis founder Sigmund Freud. While many now accept the unconscious due to extensive research, Freud’s claim that “humans are governed by the unconscious” must have been shocking at the time. Proving the unconscious’s existence is challenging since it’s invisible. However, the invisible can still be proven, like gravity, which we know exists by its effects.
Since the unconscious coexists with the conscious, it’s hard to separate actions or thoughts into unconscious and conscious results. We can prove the unconscious’s existence by focusing on the consequences if the unconscious didn’t exist. Without the unconscious, simple morning movements, like getting out of bed, would involve numerous conscious processes: calculating the angle of the waist, balance distribution between the right and left feet, and the sequence of body parts to use. When throwing a ball, we’d need to calculate the hand angle and the force in each foot. However, as we walk, we shift our weight unconsciously to maintain balance. Such results are clearly unconscious. Timothy Wilson, author of Strangers to Ourselves, reports rare cases of unconscious damage. He states it’s unimaginable to consider a world with only a conscious mind, comparing it to Maggie’s awkward and slow-motion speed bag practice in Million Dollar Baby.
The unconscious undoubtedly exists, occupying most of our mental activity. Imagine it as a pyramid, with consciousness at the very top and the majority below as the unconscious. The unconscious is likened to the submerged part of an iceberg. If there’s a super-consciousness, it would be at the very bottom. The unconscious is a blessing. Wilson compares the mind to an administrative organization, with consciousness as high-ranking officials and the unconscious as lower-ranking officials, including local public servants. Perception and language comprehension are handled by the unconscious, while higher-level reasoning and analysis occur in the conscious. Skills like riding a bike or using chopsticks are acquired and processed by lower-ranking officials, while general knowledge and experiences are typically conscious memories.
Our senses have no memory devices; our unconscious handles it. Sometimes, we learn things effortlessly or without knowing exactly what we’re learning. Once acquired, this information becomes a habit, influencing other behaviors. Someone who has learned to skate easily picks up skiing. Mastering one foreign language makes learning another easier. Such procedural memories are long-lasting and difficult to change, hence Frankie’s emphasis on forgetting bad posture to the bone in Million Dollar Baby. South Korean golfer Shi-Hyun Ahn was known for her reverse C swing, a finish position where the body curves like a backward C. She practiced a more straightforward, upright I swing, stating in an interview that she trained to the point of no return.
Training activates the unconscious, as doing everything consciously is tough, and the unconscious is more efficient for quick execution. Most administrative tasks are handled faster by local officials or lower-ranking ones. If high-ranking officials handled every civil complaint, life would be like a society without a government. Writing requires much thought, but also remembering and recalling information. Finding everything one by one makes it hard to fill even a page a day, but writing allows more time. Speaking, however, needs immediate response, and we can only think of seven chunks of information at once. Effective speaking requires a wide and varied vocabulary and sentence memory. Skills involve knowing words and training to speak them unconsciously. Notebooks can help, but they’re just auxiliary short-term memory devices. The difference in ability between someone consciously processing seven pieces of information and someone with more at hand can change outcomes.
Many actions require faster responses than speaking, like handling objects. Activities like golf, tennis, and baseball are examples. A golf swing takes less than 2 seconds from start to finish, with average golfers spending 0.5 seconds on the backswing, 0.2 seconds at the top, 0.15 seconds on the downswing, and finishing in about 1.6 to 1.8 seconds. In baseball, a batter has about 0.2 seconds to decide to swing. A 145 km/h pitch reaches home plate in 0.45 seconds. The brain takes about 0.25 seconds to recognize the ball and command a swing, leaving less than 0.2 seconds to act.
Conscious thinking speed is inadequate for such actions. Thinking is crucial for strategizing and preparing, not for action moments. Soldiers train extensively for war, but not all tactics are beneficial. Only well-trained unconscious actions are useful. In emergencies, like flying bullets and nearby explosions, the most trained actions will surface. South Korea’s 600,000 troops train rigorously for scenarios that may never occur to act as trained during real emergencies. Scrap’s exhortation to Maggie to “instinctively acquire” skills in Million Dollar Baby is for this reason.
Delegating to the unconscious during execution is more efficient. Our lives become easier when much of our thinking is entrusted to the unconscious. Freud posited that the unconscious exists not due to repression but for efficiency. Wilson emphasizes that “the human mind operates most efficiently when a significant part of high-level, sophisticated thinking is delegated to the unconscious,” akin to modern jetliners flying smoothly on autopilot with minimal input from a conscious pilot. Training involves consciously understanding and thinking about good posture principles, but execution time calls for delegation to more efficient lower-ranking officials. Typing is similar; checking each key slows us down and increases errors. Golf swings take an average of 1.8 seconds, but the downswing is just 0.15 seconds, insufficient for conscious instructions. Overthinking during a swing disrupts unconscious efficiency, akin to a superior constantly instructing subordinates during busy times. Starting a swing means it’s too late for conscious thinking, which should be done during practice. Golf legend Nancy Lopez said, “The simpler, the better the game.”
We don’t consciously calculate our weight distribution or foot pressure to stand from a chair; the unconscious handles it. However, not all unconscious learning is correct. Proper training is essential to control the unconscious consciously, forming correct posture and form. Habits are hard to change because they reside in the unconscious. Conscious effort needs constant vigilance to overcome unconscious habits. Conscious training ensures the unconscious operates correctly. Lower-ranking officials don’t always report to higher-ups or make decisions on their own. Persistent customs exist in long-standing practices. Thus, education and training are necessary. Unconscious actions in our lives are similar. Repeated training ensures cells recognize importance, and the unconscious executor remembers correctly.
Even with adequate training, consciousness must stay alert, as lower-ranking officials can’t always be trusted. Immediate retraining isn’t possible, but identifying problems is. Crucial information should be frequently recalled to strengthen memory. The Bible says “Do not be afraid” 365 times, and during the Cold War, Pastor Richard Wurmbrand relied on these words daily while imprisoned in Romania for smuggling Bibles. “Do not be afraid” is not hard to understand, but unconscious execution isn’t guaranteed despite the unconscious’s efficiency. Repeated training by the conscious is necessary for vital habits. We must organize essential knowledge and store it compactly within the conscious while training the unconscious to operate continuously. Gu Bon-Hyung, author of Seek from People, shares a favorite quote:
“A dancer must dance every day, an artist must draw every day, and a writer must write every day. Just as a swordsman must train daily to avoid risking his life, we must train daily.”
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