Once you get it, you won't forget it.
As they say, it is like riding a bike, which is what we did with Smallsteps today outside the front of the house on the footpath. Like most kids, she didn't get it straight away and we will try again tomorrow, but considering this was the first time, she did pretty well and when she was able to muster enough speed, she at least started to get the feel of the dynamics of the bike. There was only a minimal amount of complaining too.
I remember learning to ride for the first in front of my house too when I was about five years of age. I got a bike for Christmas, a yellow BMX with "tuffs" - the hard plastic wheels instead of spokes. With hand-me-downs from three older brothers, the bike was one of the first things I remember that was truly mine. I sometimes wonder how much of an influence these kinds of experiences have had on my personality and opinions about ownership.
Learning to ride was a bit different for me, as I was far more an athletic kid, than an academic. It took about fifteen minutes to find my balance and from then on, I was on my way. However, all of the worst injuries I have had in my life have been on bikes - and a couple biggies on rollerblades too. Still, having a bike felt like freedom and since I often had few friends to play with, I would spend hours just riding around the local streets by myself, though I was a little more cautious than my brother on Bond Street.
Coordination is an interesting thing physically and I like watching as Smallsteps begins learning new things and her body is all disjointed and at first, refuses to work together. But as she continues on, bits starts to fall into place and align, moving from the jerky motion of thought into the fluid space of unconscious competence. Each of us is different, but it always takes time to find the balance, but the length of time varies.
I think riding a bike is a good analogy for life in general, as no one is born able to do it naturally, everyone needs practice to find the balance and help to have the skills to get there. Life itself is easy, alignment with the conditions is a challenge, as different skills are needed to negotiate various aspects and the conditions themselves are always changing. Failing to change with the conditions, will generally mean falling off the bike or, not being able to move at all.
Many people are proud of their unwillingness to change, as if it is a trait to be celebrated in a life that demands change. They seem to think that their steadfastness in their resolve makes them powerful, without understanding that it is a weakness and likely a position of fear. Change brings in uncertainty of personal action and outcome, which is why people fear it. Many would rather stay the way they are and blame the world for their outcomes, because the conditions do not align with their activity, so they can feel themselves victims. They are victims. Victims of themselves.
Perhaps this is why so many claim the position of "can't teach on old dog new tricks" as the older we get, the further we move away from our memories of childhood and all the daily challenges we faced and overcame to get to where we are today. For many, it seems that this mindset of change resistance is affecting us younger and younger, where people in their twenties and thirties claim "old dog" conditions.
It is sad when at potentially the most productive stage of our lives where we can use the energy and memory of youth to shape our future, so many people stagnate. There are lots of things to waste in this world, many of us are wasting away due to the belief that there is no better thing to do than what we are already doing.
I think that many people these days claim victimhood for attention, as if they are hard done by, by the world itself, without seeing that the world they live and experience is just a set of conditions that they have to negotiate with. A changing set of conditions. Playing the victim of conditions card used to be a position of weakness - now people see it as something to be celebrated and rewarded - it seems to bring with it a sense of entitlement, as if the victim is owed something, that the deserve something, even though they themselves are unwilling to do something about their position and learn the conditions and align their behaviors.
It is far easier to say, "I will not change for anything."
That is okay, we each make our own decisions. But, if you aren't willing to change, I am not willing to spend my time helping, as what is the point? Oh, the help you want is a handout.
Don't try to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and it irritates the pig.”
-Anthony De Mello
Time is potential energy to waste, a resource that can be applied in an infinite number of ways, wasting it means to apply it poorly, so why spend time trying to help those who do not wish to change, all they want is what they want, regardless of whether they act in balance and alignment with conditions. It is tiring to try to help people who claim to want the support, but simultaneously do not wish to change.
My daughter wants to learn to ride a bike, but if she is unwilling to sit in the saddle, peddle her legs, find her balance and turn - if she expects me to hold her and push her for the rest of her life - even if I do this - she will still not know how to ride a bike, she will still not have the skill to have learned and she will never have the feeling of freedom. Her experience on a bike will be forever owned by me.
For her to have freedom of experience, she has to be willing to constantly change. The people who are proud to stay the same, are prisoners of themselves. Freedom is always constrained by conditions. Freedom is the ability to change with them.
It is like riding a bike.
Once you get it, you won't forget it.
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]