Let it go

Minx met Ruth because she lived 'just down the road' so it was an excuse for hand-delivered orders and gradually longer bike-chat sessions. Minx admires Ruth's dedication to scary downhill stuff, Ruth pretends not to think Minx is a wimp for sticking firmly to one gear and a complete lack of suspension. Here's her first post...

I’m sure Daniel Goleman, he of ‘Emotional Intelligence’ best selling, book fame - if you can remember that far back to the mid 1990s - would have had something to say about the interplay (or maybe the disjuncture) between the messages you get from your head and the ones you get from your heart.

You see, I have a bit of habit of coming at stuff, including my riding, with my rational, switched on, ‘thinking brain’, all fired up and ready to guide me through the rocky stuff (literally and metaphorically speaking).  Tricky root fest adorning an off camber drop in? … no problem, adjust speed, roll in, lay off brakes, look ahead to exit point, allow the suspension to do its thing ... job done.

Ah ha! my clever head says, ‘you see’, knowledge applied correctly means that your brain chemistry is coordinating your body mechanics and all is well in the world of off road riding stability.  It’s all nanosecond stuff; but it’s still a triumph for my thinking brain.

But you know what? My best moments; the times when I genuinely experience that magic dust stuff that the journos call ‘flow’, when my bike and body work seamlessly together.  Well I don’t ‘think’ that stuff at all.  It’s my pure, base evolutionary brain synapses instinctively creating movement and anticipating the trail ahead.   You’ll know it when you feel it, cause you’ll be darned if you can describe what it was you just did … you just know that it felt right.

Which says to me that maybe there’s a time to switch off the busy mind and let it go; that’ll be riding with your heart.

Ruth