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The author explores the narrow boundary, often imperceptible, between education (formation / acquisition) and training, between freedom and subjugation – which is reflected disturbingly in a circus setting. The “exercise” carries the possibility of this “bifurcation” the humanization of man demanding the reduction of his animal self, which further supports the Kantian position. The reference to the Stoics shows instead that the obstacle is not the animal but what separates man from himself, stultitia. Avoiding this requires certain types of exercises on oneself, of care for oneself as P. Hadot and Foucault have shown. But on the side of training, one finds the Augustinian position based on a nature perceived as flawed. It must recover a kind of self-denial by ascetic self-affirmation of the subject as proposed by Descartes. The author then reflects on the proposal of Ignatius of Loyola situating the exercises in the relation of a master to disciple which aims at access to one’s own interiority; understanding oneself and interpreting oneself through one’s own process of formation. The article concludes with W. Benjamin: if training refers to the domination of machinery on the individual, the exercise incorporates the child into the world through the experience of language and contributes to the formation of the social community and provides freedom to be oneself.