Life Experiences Add Up

DOWNTIME

Do you sometimes feel like you are treading water? I do. It’s that feeling of moving through your day rather robotically, living your life in the same way; waking up, eating, driving to work, driving home from work, socializing, sleeping and starting over again the next day. Periods of times like these don’t happen that often for me, but when they do, it feels almost like I am on the precipice of something new. Treading water creates time for me that provides a launching pad for profound change. It’s called downtime peoples – the calm before the storm.

I do not think human beings like to be idle anymore. The message in the busy internet universe is that down time is unsettling. Why are we so afraid of turning off ? I have just come off of a work schedule that for the better part of three months, has been non-stop. I’m talking three weeks in a row with no day off. And now I am living with some down time – repetitiveness. I am taking it slow, letting things be and seeing where they take me. The last time I had down time I started this blog and started cycling. What a change in my life both of these activities have brought me.

Why does down time produce such great results? Because your brain needs a chance to have space for true creative thinking to come through. When we are relaxing, the brain does not really slow down or stop working. Many important mental processes seem to require what we call downtime and other forms of rest during the day. Downtime replenishes the brain’s stores of attention and motivation, encourages productivity and creativity, and is essential to both achieve our highest levels of performance and simply form stable memories in everyday life.

As so eloquently put by Scientific American,

A wandering mind unsticks us in time so that we can learn from the past and plan for the future. Moments of respite may even be necessary to keep one’s moral compass in working order and maintain a sense of self.

Sad to say, but it takes a bit of discipline to stay in a down time period. It can be scary because what are we if not leading a purposeful life? It can be scary because once we are stripped of all the labels that we identify ourselves with (wife, mother, father, son, daughter, overachiever, etc.) who are we really? It is times just like these that we can learn that very thing – who we are!

So how do we truly decompress, tune out, and enjoy downtime? The first step for me is to let go of the concept “I have to be doing something right now”. It’s okay to not, it’s okay to just take the dog for a walk, read a book, be a couch potato and spend some time with yourself. What do I do?

I make yoga a priority – I go twice a week. It’s only two hours out of my week and those two hours are luxurious. I focus on my breath and I focus on the pose I am holding, letting go of everything else. If I fill my mind with clutter, I lose the pose. This is a great philosphy to have in life.
Soak in Epsom salts. I make this a priority. I try to soak three times a week – even just for 20 minutes. I emerge relaxed, and it gives me time to catch up on my reading while totally indulging myself.
I walk the dog, but in the dark. My favorite time to go is early morning – the stars are out in full force and so is the moon. Since it’s hard to see, my hearing kicks in and I pay attention to things like the wind rustling the leaves. It’s truly a special time for me.

Granted, these are things that work for me but in reading this, you might find things which work for you when you have this precious down time. Remember, life’s “ah-ha” moments come when our brains are free of clutter, so turn-off, decompress when you can, and let your creative processes flow!

RAGBRAI part deux

So I completed RAGBRAI for another year, much to my surprise. I hadn’t planned on riding again this summer – once was enough (or so I thought). I came away with a sense of satisfaction after completing the ride in 2014 and figured I could cross it off my list. And so last summer turned into fall, which turned into winter, which turned into me riding RAGBRAI again. How did this come about? Last January, while in Florida for a business trip, the RAGBRAI route selection party was underway in Des Moines with the route for 2015 set to be announced. Our support vehicle driver from the previous year was hell-bent on driving us on RAGBRAI again, even though we didn’t commit. She was poised and ready to pounce on lining up hotels for us the minute the route was announced (just in case). The announcement was delivered and she immediately started booking hotel rooms near or close to all the overnight towns for 2015. She succeeded and the texts started flying between all of us on the ‘Moving Tassles’ team…”just in case I booked hotel rooms”, “this year we won’t have to camp” and “oh come on life is too short”, “let’s do it again” …And so it went, and so we rode again this summer.

For a little bit of background history on the actual selection of the route, the RAGBRAI route is different every year. There is an annual selection party in January held in Des Moines, where with big fanfare, the route for the upcoming year is announced. The RAGBRAI route averages 468 miles and contrary to popular opinion, is not always flat. The ride begins somewhere along Iowa’s western border and ends along the eastern border on the Mississippi River. The route changes each year with 2014 being one of the”easier” rides and this years ride one of the more challenging. Just to compare mileage, in 2014 I logged in 452 miles and this year, the total mileage for me was 519. What was the difference? A few things.

I rode the optional Karas loop again this year ( an optional 25-mile loop dedicated in honor of John Karas, one of the founder’s of RAGBRAI) but this year, just for fun, they threw in an optional gravel loop for cyclists brave enough to add 15 bumpy miles to their trek. The special loop — in honor of Steve Hed, a wheel innovator and founder of Minnesota-based Hed Cycling who died in November — was tacked onto the 68-mile stretch from Storm Lake to Fort Dodge. Not too many cyclists rode this stretch, but after a rather uncertain start, I settled into the rhythm of biking on gravel and thoroughly enjoyed myself. The ride was quiet – hardly any bikers – and the vibe was one of serenity with nothing but miles and miles of corn, billowy clouds, blue sky and the wind at your back. Along the way, the local farm implement dealer who had tractors dotting his front lawn, served us cold lemonade. Halfway through the loop ride, we had a stop at the host town – Pomeroy. Population 646, this little community threw one of the best parties in Iowa that day. Locals dotted the sidewalk in their lawn chairs, watching the cyclists streak by. The owner of the only bar in town, “Bryons” is known for booking great talent and he outdid himself with the blues band he lined up for the day – one word – AWESOME! Word got out about this one, as RAGBRAI’ers always seem to find the great parties, and state troopers had to close down the bar by 3:00 that afternoon due to over capacity. Byron’s had that great old smell – just like the scent you get from a really old book. It was like going back in time. The musty smell still resonates with me. The beer flowed, it was a beautiful sunny day and everyone seemed to be thoroughly enjoying themselves.

Another addition of mileage to our route was the location of our hotels. Yes, we scrapped camping and lived it up at the local Holiday Inn Express and Fred’s Motel. The Moving Tassles (or ‘Team 1%’ since we were the upper crust of lodgers) logged in additional miles each day biking to our lodging at the end of the day, and then back to the route at the beginning of the day. The last and most important difference maker in the ride in terms of difficulty was the feet of climb. A ball buster. The first day in 2014 was 1,771 feet of climb compared to 3,941 in 2015. What a way to start the ride! The total average feet of climb in 2014 was 1,616 and in 2015 was 2,180 – quite different terrain.

Each year is different and if I ride again next year, there will be something new along the way. Just in the mere two years of doing this, we have all new stories and new adventures. We had two new riders on our crew this year. This year we threw in a “search for your family roots” theme. One of our teammates spent the winter on ancestry.com researching her family tree which happened to originate near our starting point of Sioux City, so we visited a few gravestones along the way for a photo-op. My husbands grandfather owned the Standard Oil gas station in Wilton, which happened to be a rest stop town, so we cruised into the gas station and talked to the current owner, and lo and behold, he had pictures on the wall of Jim’s grandfather – turns out he was a legend. The Iowa Craft Beer Tent could be found along the way, and on day one, upon stopping for a delicious brew, we received a punch card and if you got 10 punches (1 for each beer), you received a t-shirt on your last day. I think that was the longest any of us rode for a lousy tee-shirt.

Why did I really ride again? There is something about this ride that gets under your skin without you even noticing it. As the months dwindled after the first ride, I found myself looking back on those warm Iowa days longingly, remembering pedaling through truly pretty country, the unique farmhouses, barns and windmills. The smell of the dew in the morning, fresh-cut hay and biking through the morning mist as it slowly rises above the fields is a truly special experience. Riding along without a care in the world to accomplish something, chatting it up with a friend or a total stranger is a great way to spend a week. Hearing about people’s lives and what the road does to change lives for them are conversations I will always remember. From towns surrounded by rolling farming land to charmers set along the banks of rivers and villages there is a distinct cultural heritage along with beauty that comes in all varieties in Iowa. Did I ride solely because of those text messages I received in January? I think not. I think it was the alluring call of a misty covered corn field in the morning, of silos and farm houses speckling the landscape, of crazy dressed up people, of food, beer and camaraderie. The people of Iowa truly make RAGBRAI the special event that it is by opening up their towns and communities to participants and the riders are the icing on the cake.

Hopefully – here’s to another year!

We Hardly Ever see the Cousins Anymore

Oh how I love that line from one of my favorite all time movies – “Peggy Sue Got Married”. Peggy, played by Kathleen Turner, gets a chance to go back in time to her senior year in high school where she finds herself with an opportunity to change a life altering circumstance; one she thought she regretted. From her adult perspective in her teenage body, when she sees her then teenage sister, she gives her an enthusiastic hug and says how nice it is to see her and that “we hardly ever see the cousins anymore” – a concept that her sister does not understand because at that point in time, the cousins were constantly in their lives. That line in the movie has always resonated with me because I have always felt that moving on is an inevitable thing, but deep down I did not think it would happen to me.

How relationships change and how people move in and out of our spheres of life is unfathomable when we are younger. During my child rearing years, my core group of friends with whom I raised my children with, socialized with and whose lives tripped over each other all the time were the centrifugal force in my life. Our relationships did not require a concerted effort because our lives were intertwined with school, church, girl scouts, volunteering and just the need to be together to unwind due to the pressures of parenting. Our interests and focus was all the same – the kids.

Then, the slowness creeps in. Children grow up and move on, work lives take on different twists and turns, and you realize that you are not seeing your friends as much as you used to. There is not that constant collision with each other on a daily basis. There creeps in a realization that these relationships take nurturing, time and effort. There are a million reasons why a friendship may change over time and losing a connection point can be one of them. It is an inevitable fact that life takes people in new directions; growing apart from old friends becomes a part of our lives. As I was feeling this “slowness”, I also felt myself mourning; mourning the changes that life brings, mourning not being in touch as much. I felt a deep loneliness and sense of obligation about these important relationships in my life. I used to think that I was immune, that this was someone else’s story. But in my discussions with people in my age bracket and my core group of friends, we are all aware of this happening to all of us.

As time moves on; however, I have gotten better at understanding that friendships and relationships ebb and flow and that is a good thing. People come into our lives for a reason, just as they occasionally move out of our lives. It does not mean that we no longer care about one another. I still love my friends and always will, regardless of the frequency of our visits. I still see them and enjoy the time when we get together and we always pick up where we left off. When you accept it and stop feeling bad about it, you stop taking it so personally. Moving on doesn’t mean forgetting – you can continue to love your friends and experience your friendships for a very long time – just in a different way. The relationship is not damaged and in need of repair, it’s just moved on to a different level.

This new perspective offered me a whole new way of looking at all my relationships. I discovered that I could find a deeper fullness and quality in others by putting things into this view. People come into our lives for particular reasons, and things are likely to change. If we can give to those around us, and take from them only what we’re able, then we have a much better chance of looking back fondly, and with gratitude.

The good times you shared with friends don’t have to fade if your connection does. Think of them often, laugh about old times, and share great stories. Moving on doesn’t mean forgetting all of the meaningful ways you connected in the past. You can continue to love your friends and experience your friendships in new and sometimes even better ways. There are more meaningful ways to connect in the future!