Day 185: Spin

I survived my first spin class. As mentioned in my previous post, my friend T., who has completed the Ironman (!!), has been taking the class for awhile, and it's full of very intense triathlete/cycling types, who bring their own tri-bikes. It was definitely challenging, but I appreciated the challenge. Being with others definitely made me push harder than I thought I could--or, more precisely, than I particularly wanted to. The mental challenge.

Lots of thoughts, upon reflection, but my daughter is yelling for a different puzzle and my son for a different game, and we're late for playgroup. Aha. Real life, you see. It tends to interrupt.

Back again. Cupboards opened, problems (temporarily) solved.

I've been thinking about how to focus this project in order to make it book-worthy. I'm not interested in writing a how-to manual, because I'm not one for using how-to manuals myself. And I don't think it should be a motivational guide. But what came to me after class today is how there are so many pursuits that ask us to give ourselves away. Do you know what I mean? You have to give yourself over to the thing that you are pursuing; or, simply, give yourself away. Give of yourself. In a sense, I think that's what many of us are seeking out in our lives. We want to give ourselves to something greater than we alone could be.

Motherhood (fatherhood, too!) belongs in that category. Spiritual pursuits. Charity work. Mission work. Callings. Art. And, yes, the physical pursuits. And there are so many varieties of intensity. There is me, wanting to try-a-tri, or maybe a sprint. There are those who have completed triathlons, but who aren't interested in time. There are those who are shaving time off their personal bests. There are those who compete with the best, at a level quite beyond what I can imagine doing. But I don't think it all boils down to competition. There is something bigger at play, deeper, some fundamental desire to test the spirit.

I don't know whether that subject would make a book. What would my angle be? Interviews with people who have sacrificed in order to complete fairly outrageous goals? The Mother Theresas and Everest-climbers of the world? But it's the more ordinary people, the unsung, who throw themselves into new challenges at every turn in their lives, who interest me. I love reading obituaries. The ones that move me most describe lives of richness and commitment and variety. The woman who completed her doctorate while raising four children and became an expert in her field. The man who switched careers at 55. The artist who never gave up despite a life of obscurity and self-doubt.

It's a little bit Oprah. I do feel that. But I also felt, in this class this morning, that these extreme pursuits are really available to any of us--we just have to want to do it. We just have to pick the right pursuit and give ourselves over to it. (Whether or not it's possible to do that while maintaining a healthy balanced life is an open question--I would like to talk to people who manage, however it is that they manage. Maybe that's my angle.)

I'm going back to that class next week. Definitely.