When you’re learning to ride a bike, the best way to learn is to take the pedals off. Pedals provide forward motion when we master the skill of balance, but they also prevent our natural balance as they cause us to struggle to regain control of the machine, the bike itself, and in that panic reach for the pedals, break our balance and fall. Instead of using the pedals, you use your legs propel along, a few steps at a time, tap tap tap until you gather your courage, lift up your legs, and…coast.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this notion of inherent balance, something within us all, when we trust ourselves to let go, struggle less, and coast. I’ve been struggling a lot with the swirling ups and downs of our Great Pause- Covid. Typically, I try to think my way out of a problem, wrestling with it, seeing if I can ‘fix it’. Yep. I might need to check my humility there. The thing is, the more I struggle, the more out of balance I feel. Rather than observe and absorb, I resist, pull, struggle- and it’s exhausting. There’s so much being thrown at us at the moment, a barrage of information, visual overload verbal too. So I’ve switched off. I’m choosing when to listen and when to reset my balance, rather than let the 24hour news cycle take over. So much of life is filled with struggles and the only the thing we can control is our reaction to it. Will we struggle? Will we accept and coast? I think the latter in view of present times is the more sensible option.
So, I’m learning to let go, releasing the tension of pulling too hard on how I want life to be, to accepting it for how it is. The machinery of life, the bike, I’m still on, a little wobbly depending on the day, but I’m learning to trust my balance, my hands still on the steering wheel, the pace my own. I’m learning to trust that I can carry myself in better balance with what is, rather than in discord with what I want it to be.
