Food for Thought

Can the world accommodate everyone living in their purpose, with every step and decision intentionally propelling them towards their pre-designed destiny? Many people I know are like trains locked into tracks made of responsibilities, obligations and social expectations, unforgiving and unrelenting. We are governed by mantras like – “man must chop” and “I have a family to think of”, the system needs everyone to play their role to exist, we must go to work to earn and pay the mortgage, the bank must give loans to kids to go to college, who must in turn find a job to pay back those loans and on and on. The system needs us just like we need it.

Staring out this window at my regular 15 minutes work breakfast, I watch people file into worker, I ponder their faces. Some look like they are still trying to fully awaken while others look laden by what awaits them as they walk in the door. I see some people who look like drones, compelled to put in their 8 hours by some unseen force, living for the 48hrs between Friday and Monday. I can’t help but wonder – are all these people doing what they want to do or better yet, are they doing what they are meant to do? Is it possible for us all to do what we are meant to do?

Can the world support a mass awakening, the systems: education, financial, political, social even spiritual are all built on people sucking it up and accepting the hand dealt, what would happen if half the people in our jobs decide to quit tomorrow and follow their heart, downsize and live for contentment. I am not quite sure. Would that be a good or a bad thing? What if the farmer, accountant, doctor decides to quit and become a musician, or load up a backpack and through hike the Appalachian trail? As much as I want this for everyone, I wonder how this would play out. In the Garden of Eden, God gave Adam work to do, I assume he liked doing it, it was what he was meant to do. The woes of living in a fallen world.

As usual I have more questions than answers. I just am moved by our collective level of compromise, overwhelmed by the courage and vulnerability required to unshackle oneself and take the leap, intimately aware of the possibility of failure which if the other face of the coin on which courage lies. The saddest part is that the effort required to dream for a better tomorrow or contemplate decisions in the past that has lead us to our today, actually ends up robbing us of today. I guess all we can and should do is keep fighting, keep dreaming but all the while not forgetting to keep leaving because as of today, TODAY is all we have.

I do need to get some pictures, I know posts without pictures to lighten up the melancholy sometimes end up sounding depressing

 

The Planks.

 

I feel myself plummeting down this narrow sketchy patch of snow and ice, the lift line at the bottom of the run is approaching a lot faster than I would expect or like. I know I don’t want to skid my turns, like some of the seemingly cool kids do with a roost spraying off the trails of their skis, I want to be in control, riding the edges and using controlled turns to bleed speed the whole way down, however, that is not working. My brainstem is going crazy and relentlessly firing up my reflexes, I start leaning back, fighting gravity and turning away from the fall line. On a black diamond slope, things are happening so much faster, the stakes are higher and time for recovery is scant. I am rattled now and questioning my decision to turn down this trail, the next pitch is coming up and its much steeper.

The common thread that weaves through all these events, actions and reactions is the ever present “Fear”.

I read somewhere that there are only two emotions: Love and Fear. All negative emotions come fear, fear drives us to run, it dissuades us from inching closer to the edge, and taking the plunge, it keeps us grounded in the safe and predictable. We standby, watch others riding the waves, making the turns, airing it out and tell ourselves things like: “they have less to loose”, “they are much younger”, “they heal quicker than I do” when we see someone crash we hang on that as justification for our “caution/fear” Missing the point would be thinking that I am saying to endanger yourself, however we must be reasonably uncomfortable, a state where we feel more, are more vivid and embody a more intense version of ourselves.

After getting in the back seat a couple times, and unsuccessfully forcing my skis to turn before the edges engage, I stop!

At the edge of the trail, I take some deep breaths and acknowledge fear, yes this is dangerous, but it is not ever going to be, this trail is never going to get less steep just like I am never going to stop wanting to ski it, so today is as good a day as any to do it. I keep my eyes ahead – looking where I’m going and not where I have been, drop into proper squared up stance, I feel for my shin against the tongue of my boots and tell myself to keep them there, I loosen up and let the planks ride, carving Ses in the snow and ice. Fear is calling but I’m really not listening, just letting them skis ride, all the while loving not fearing.

Thanks for stopping by

Daring

I remember how I got into biking; I was astonished by the weight (pun intended) of the number staring back at me when I stepped on the scaled, in pom’s nomenclature I weighed more than about 10 stone. I reluctantly forked out $400 for my new bike, astonished that the bike guy was not overly impressed with my extravagance, I was half expecting the machine to levitate since I paid so much for it. Reality set in when I went to the back of the shop and saw bikes with multi thousand dollar sticker prices, I remember blacking out for a couple seconds. Thinking back to that time, I was completely open to learning something new, a champion of change, desire was strong and motivation virile, food tasted better and I took my tea spicy. For someone who had never been on anything more complicated that a vintage racing bike I stole from a friend in college, my 21 speed looked to me like a fighter jet.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

I doubt anyone has ever crashed as many times as I did on my first mountain bike ride. In my anticipations, I looked up mountain biking videos on YouTube and as you would expect I binged on hours on downhill mountain biking, planning to reenact these moves at my local trail on my $400 100mm travel pogo stick – I cannot be faulted for not trying, as you would expect, the results however was nothing like the videos. Ignorance about riding styles, equipment and abilities, was less than blissful let’s just say. I remember plummeting down gullies, and grabbing hand full of the front brake only to go over the bars, giving trees hugs, changing tubes, I remember how incomprehensible changing gears were and how unforgiving little humps were to submit. I can’t remember doing anything that hard before, even for someone who swims like a stone, this was immeasurable harder than my 10 week training block for a triathlon. Despite the toil, I still dreamt about being on that $400 bike every day, I still saw myself as Hans Ray. At this point in my life, I embraced change, I was not scared by something new, I did not care about success or failure, I just wanted to do something and Hot dog , I went out an did it.

Black Eyed Susans (Maryland State flower)

Attempt at a landscape shot… Not doing much for me

I just picked up a much smaller machine recently, this hast highlights have changed over the past few years. I picked up a nifty Olympus Pen E17 mirrorless DSLR camera, great entry level mirrorless camera. Photography has always moved me, in my heart, right next to the chamber which only great music occupies, is a space for awe inspiring images, just below the gourmet tacos chamber. I have however noticed a strange trepidation when it comes to fully immersing myself into this new experience. As a millennial accustoms to ever changing screens and buttons, I am completely overwhelmed by this device. Some much to learn; ISO, shutter speed, aperture, light displacement, image composition, hundreds of hours to be invested to even be mediocre at it. I constantly see myself wanting to just give up and go to the status quo of taking overly processed images on my iPhone using Instagram filters. I believe the greatest strength of a leader is anticipating and accepting change, its uncomfortable, it’s difficult and it can be avoided for only so long.

My best shot so far… I think the model makes it, not the shooter

 

Through this, I have learnt to extend grace to the hidebound, to appreciate that every person experienced a time when they were vibrant and open, receptive and zealous, but slowly life and its minions make security the priority and society demonizes risk. I plan on mastering this photography thing, I plan on being good at it, I plan on having It add color, texture and context to my ballet of and in life and then I plan on moving on to sometime new before I settle into my immovable way of eating shrimp with old bay or none at all.

I leave you with this quote by Theodore Roosevelt

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, though checkered by failure… than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight what knows neither victory nor defeat.

Thanks for stopping by.

To Pacify..

Here is how I feel today

In our microwave society, a pacifier is the ultimate symbol of our desired state of ideals. The burst of contentment it provides to a wailing child is abrupt and absolute, it captures and distracts, albeit it temporarily. It takes away the object of a child’s desire, that thing that prompted the crying in the first place. We constantly live life actively or passively pacifying, this is evident in the numerous addictions we all carry, some big, others small, no one is free, everyone has something calling their name, something they are running from, and in many ways running back to. We distracts, comforts, quiets the things that trouble us… We pacify our needs.

Unfortunately, distractions are just that – distractions, merely transient captors of desire, respite from yearnings that cannot quenched. What it gives never quite goes deep enough, it only caresses when a good scratching is needed. The one resistor to this pacification is the voice of the Heart, logic and rational win over the brain and the mind but the heart sits in silent rebellion, waiting, like Samson in the chains of the philistines, it bids its time, waiting for the opportunity to push down the pillars and return you to reality.

Recently, I have been in a deep state of pacification, chained to a cubicle, a three walled cell which is bigger than my previous cell. I continue to journey up the ladder of cooperate ladder but down this narrow dark hallway like a cow led to the slaughter room. My heart calls, begging me to snap out of it, but now I am good at ignoring it, besides my brain yells much louder. I have put my heart in a dark room and not gone back for some time, and for some time it has let me be but the ambush has been sprung – like waves of old Negro spiritual floating over a southern night, it calls for liberty, it cry’s for freedom, it cry’s for adventure.

Unlike many people, I know what I want to do, where I want to be, and what is stopping me (my good old friend fear.) The bottom line is my heart is about to make a break for it, it will either be let out of the jail or it will be broken trying to do so.

 

Walking the Talk

the saying “be careful what you wish for” has become cliche but as with all things cliche they are usually true. If you follow my blog you know I constantly wrestle and sometimes romanticize change, wishing for it and trying to juxtapose it with our need and fear for it. 

  
Well change is on the horizon for me and not surprising it brings in its wake anxiety and dare I say fear… Fear is something so primal, yet It separats the called from the chosen. As is a customary, a long or hard ride, for me,separates the perceived from the real, climbing up rockygap road, my mind a mine kaleidoscope of thoughts, I look up at I’m at th the top, it was not particularly any easier to get up it but after riding it a score of times it is now familiar. I’m no longer afraid of it, all that needs done is stepping in the water. 

  
My all time favorite quote is by JFK: “Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat”. 

The Unknown

Sitting on the steps of my driveway, the  Fall chill sipping past my soft shell jacket, my skin and nose bask in the crisp aroma of tired leaves, the atmosphere saturated with the smell of fall, and the sun – missing in action. It was decision time: do I go on this ride or not? You see, every once in a while, especially post riding hiatus comprising of full on absence from the saddle, I decide on some big exploratory ride the theme (slow and long) where I attempt to go off lots of unbeaten paths and explore roads I have never been on before. It so happens that somehow on those rides I end up riding some variation of the rides I already know, I never really get lost, I stay constrained in my curiosity and always stay within the buffer of the familiar.

What do we fear in the unknown? Is it trepidation of mental and physical anguish we might experience in discovering it, or the effort required in embracing and mastering it, maybe its just the awareness of our nakedness and ignorance made glaringly apparent in a state of not knowing. I think in my case, my fear is that I might not be able to afford the cost of the venture. Due to the significant topographical fluctuations in elevation (climbing) around Cumberland, I would have to climb and/or decend a couple thousand feet before I even reach uncharted territory, when finally on virgin territory the further I go the more worried I become: I worry about how climbing lies ahead, am I going to get lost and have to backtrack, what about getting back home? I am going to have to do all that climbing to get back home (this conversation set to the Banjo ridden soundtrack of Deliverance as I go deep into Appalachia). The fear of running out of energy is so immense I inevitably end up doing a variation of the ride I already know.

On Saturday though, I mounted and headed towards the limits of my familiarity, I got to the cross road of decision where I could turn left and head towards Centerville and back home or I could head towards Everitt, towards more struggles with gravity, towards adventure. I chose the latter. I rode all the way to Bedford PA, through a cathedral of changing colors and Fall foliage, the scrubs signaled their welcome to old man winter with bright shades or green, yellow and amber, the maple trees displayed every shade of orange occasionally liberating a confetti of spent leaves as the wind demanded, I coasted on the downhills ignoring my Garmin, I drank of the beauty and searched for a deeper meaning of all this. I dug deep looking for a palpable connection between this awe and my inadequate comprehension of God’s magnificence, constantly failing, my attention wrestled away by a vibrant shrub or a cammo-clad youngster stretching his bow.

Thanks to inadequate planning, I ran out of food was cold, worried and my butt and legs hurt. There comes a point in ever Century ride when it is no longer as much fun, you just turn the cranks in order to get to that 100mile marker. In many aspects of my life I feel that’s where I am: like I just rode past the 75mile marker and the views are beginning to look the same, the company the same since mile 1 and conversation is running thin, in my ride of life, change is imperative but I remain clueless as to its initiation. I was tired but I somehow knew I was going to make it, the hardest part had been done, I had gotten on and started riding, I had made that turn and had been rewarded for it.

I recently heard “Fear is the fruit of forgetfulness” when we forget all the other times we have taken the leap of faith and God has brought us through it builds our faith and debunks fear. Another I heard is “Faith is not the opposite of Fear…Love is” when we finally comprehend the love God has for us, and how much he has done and is willing to do for us, we gain perspective and faith and loose fear. You know, I think even those we think are brave like the Nomad and Vagabond need to ask themselves if deep down they are actually afraid of stability, assurance and calling a place home. In the Bible my favorite passage about fear is 1John 4:18 “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love”.

After 70 miles and 6k ft of climbing, I arrive home, toes numb, shoulders locked, ears and face numb but a smile frozen in place. It was difficult, it was lonely, it was hard ….. But it was New!