Yesterday, as I was out on a run with Archie, covering part of the same hilly dirt road we follow when stalking raptors, I had one of those disconnected meditative processes running seems to induce.

It was on a long uphill gradient and into the teeth of a wind gusting out of the west at up to 32kph, the phrase popped into my head . . . “lean into it.”

Now I’m aware that this phrase leapt to prominence thanks to Sheryl Sandberg and her 2013 book, Lean In, which sounded a clarion call to action for women to tackle unconscious (and all-too-conscious) bias at work. The book has been inspirational to many, and has spawned a foundation to fulfil its ideas, and I say jolly good — more of this kind of thing in general.

But I namecheck this particular work because it has so successfully leveraged an interesting idea: an idea that’s been around for aeons, and in some contexts that really works.

A good description comes in Joseph Conrad’s Lord Jim, when wordy German merchant Stein says to the novel’s narrator, Marlow,

A man that is born falls into a dream like a man who falls into the sea. If he tries to climb out into the air as inexperienced people endeavour to do, he drowns- nicht wahr?… No! I tell you! The way is to the destructive element submit yourself, and with the exertions of your hands and feet in the water make the deep, deep sea keep you up.

Yes, it lacks the directness of a Hemingway, but it’s a complex novel (and a great one). In short, Jim is a young dreamer whose search for adventure and honour is terminated in a moment of panic, when he leaps from a stricken ship full of pilgrims to save himself rather than grasp the opportunity to be a hero. Conrad liked the ‘lean in’ idea so much he had Stein repeat it.

He sat down and, with both elbows on the desk, rubbed his forehead. ‘And yet it is true it is true. In the destructive element immerse.’

In short, it’s about acceptance: resignation to one’s fate opens up new possibilities of avoiding that fate. It’s a paradox — or nearly a paradox. Some say it’s about not heeding the voice of reason, which can trick us into doing the wrong thing, and letting greater forces — perhaps beyond our understanding — take over.

Acceptance is, of course, central to oriental belief systems like Buddhism, where serenity comes from acknowledging and embracing the reality of the present moment, including its joys and sorrows, without clinging to or resisting it. Suffering arises from attachment, aversion and ignorance, so by accepting things as they are, Buddhists develop equanimity, inner peace, and a deeper understanding of the nature of reality.

Or you could think of it as similar to the Alcoholics Anonymous Serenity Prayer, which starts, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

In fact, Stein’s example is demonstrably practical. It’s well known — particularly in this country where beach life is a powerful and symbolic expression of personal freedom — that if a rip should take you out to sea, don’t obey the strong instinct to swim for shore: let the current take you.

This is because these rips tend to lose power in deeper water, so instead of exhausting yourself by fighting, let the rip carry you until it loses its impetus, and then you can swim out sideways and then back to the beach. It’s better than drowning, right?

And of course, the concept of ‘yielding’ or ‘softness overcoming hardness’ is a fundamental aspect of many traditional martial arts, such as Aikido, Judo and Wing Chun. Rather than expending effort in high-risk offensive moves, the protagonist employs their attacker’s energy against them. It’s certainly a smarter way of fighting, if you have to, and can enable less-powerful individuals to overcome larger, stronger foes.

OK, that’s quite different from shuffling up a hill at snail’s pace and getting a bit of a boost from accepting the embrace of the wind that’s holding you back, but you see the parallel? It’s not about giving up — it’s about abandoning fruitless activity. As Sheryl might say, it’s a great technique to use in the workplace, where so many forces that affect you are out of your control — which is why office jargon is full of sage phrases like ‘pick your battles’ or ‘this isn’t a hill to die on’.

This may explain the popularity of Sun Tzu’s Art of War as a kind of yuppie management manual. Certainly the old sage, who lived around 771-476 BC in China, advocated countering superior forces by avoiding confrontation, using deception and misdirection, and being patient. I can confide that these are not bad techniques for surviving in, say, an investment bank.

As with running, surrendering to the negative works with cycling, too, you may be amazed to know. Mainly for hills, though, rather than wind — a stiff headwind is always a pain in the glutes, and of philosophising can only compensate so much. But climbing, when the lactate is building up in your quads and sweat trickling into your eyes, is a good occasion for acceptance. They key is to stop thinking about the road ahead, the hurty legs and burning lungs, and just surrender to the moment. A yogic focus on each breath wheezing in and out can help with this.

Sure, you still have to propel your own mass up a fixed incline and there’s no way around it, but the knowledge that the gravity that’s hindering you now will soon give you a nice rest as you fly down the other side of the hill is a powerful motivator.

Now, having come this far, the thought dawns that, when lumbering uphill into the wind in the wake of an irritatingly jaunty Jack Russell, ‘leaning in’ is quite a useful thing to do in a purely literal sense. Indeed, Trailrunner magazine, which I have never read before, advises aspiring champions to ‘lean in’ when assaying an upward gradient. Apparently, when you tilt slightly forward, your body’s centre of mass shifts, and, yes, gravity pulls you forward.

That’s well and good for the purely physical response to a bit of uphill, but you won’t make it if your head’s not in the right space. So this is where acceptance comes in — of your own limited athleticism, the inclement weather, the immutability of hilly slopes. It’s an openness to what may come: an invocation of the wise words, ‘this too shall pass’.

As someone I heard recently put it in terms that resonate, it’s the art of not writing the ending before the plot has played out. Come to think of it, that’s definitely how these blog posts come about. Your author has no clue about where they’re going when they start. Embrace the randomness, reader — don’t fight it. You’ll just wear yourself out and never reach the end.