Conspire to glide

Oh, hello my dear House of Seeds. Guess what? I need to tell you about something that happened today. It was so beautiful, I had to capture at least a tiny corner of its beauty so I can come back and read this later — a seed, an entry in the evolving Book of Me.

 

First the not-so-special moment

Scene for context: Rainy, unremarkable campus where I work. Familiar ho-hum paths.

I’m hustling down to my cycling class with no particular thought in my head.

The world is cold, dim, inhospitable. Tense without realizing it.

 

Then the transformation

On the way back:

The world is bright and humanly glowing.

Everything I see (tree, brick, stranger, raindrop) is full of messages.

I’m warmed from within, relaxed.

And all the parts of me are singing to each other — or my farandolae are singing. From the inside-out, this most amazing feeling.

 

The important thing to remember

I can get locked up in the day.

Walled in by the false urgency of the computer screen. Knotted up in my posture and my thinking.

This is the pattern and the habit, yes.

But that singing moment is accessible, with all its beauty and peace, with a mere round-the-block bike ride. I’ve seen it happen. It’s accessible with an unremarkable amble down the road.

(Or, if I prefer, with 45 minutes of the kind of cycling where you want to lie down afterward and cry mercy.)

The heart begins to beat faster, and it talks to the blood, to the lungs. Things happen somewhere deep in the brain stem. Your balance and your tendons and all your bones at first just creak, and then at some untraceable threshold or signal, they conspire to glide together.

Breath, body, blood. Without any particular input from me.

It isn’t an endorphine high; it’s like a bodily peace and kinetic awareness. I suddenly know where all the parts are, and they love me.

 

And if I need this in the future

Future Self, it’s okay to feel like this is an impossible thing to try. It’s also okay to go amble or bike or thrash and not get the singing moment. Just remember that your brain and your bones are capable of feeling like this — that’s important. You’ve been here before and you’ll come back again. The more of these singing moments we string together, the stronger the bridge becomes and we can travel here at will — like Rally — the neural bridge to joy and flow gets strengthened.

Just remember this, and you’ll be fine.