passages

time goes by so quickly and stopping to consider a moment is often more difficult than it would seem. in 2001 i accompanied a bicycle rider, Katie Lindquist-Eriksen, in RAAM, the race across america. as part of the team, signed on to provide sportsmedicine coverage, i quickly found myself primarily a driver of the vehicles following her on a superhuman journey. she was riding almost 300 miles/day and about 21 hours/day. the winner of the race made it from coast to coast in less than nine days and barely slept 8 hours on the whole race. i drove behind her at about 14 miles/hour for nine hours/day and then moved to the leapfrog vehicle to scout out the road ahead and run errands, before driving the RV to the next stop.

she later married Kent Eriksen, who worked for Moots Bicycles, and who now has his own line of racing bicycles. i learned a lot about myself during those long hours, and not all of it was good. my communication and social skills needed more improvement than i could understand, and working under stress with little sleep and trying to multi-task required terrific concentration. i'm glad they didn't send me home in the middle of the race......... i would have missed a wonderful journey and the exposure to a pure champion and athlete with more dedication than i'll ever experience again.

at 14 mph you get to see the countryside at a pace that is almost surreal........ an almost Dali existence that few experience. how is it that we never slow down this race we call life to enjoy everything, and also everyone? my beautiful daughter Calliope recently posted on the passing of her great uncle Guenther and the love she had come to share with him and his wonderful wife Genie. he was from germany and moved to chicago after the war. his dapper dress and properly trimmed mustache bespoke his pride and love of his work as a buyer for Marshall Field. he had so many stories that i never got to hear...... where was the time?

my father, now almost 93, also has stories i've never heard and every time we get together i catch a bit of another experience that wasn't told before. why don't we chronicle the timelines of this thing we call history......... our history..... and realize that we are the sum total of our experiences to date....... the drama, the emotion, the influence that it has on our existence. maxwell maltz, in his book PsychoCybernetics, spoke about the almost computer like path we follow and the ability to alter our behavior by understanding the inner workings of our psyche. just rewriting the first chapter of a book can change the whole storyline...... and the ending. wouldn't it be possible to change our whole course with just one emotional change of an early event? i've worked with hundreds of patients and have found just that........ the ability to change our total health and wellness just by resolving a negative event from long ago........ if only there was enough time to work with everyone..... and have them understand how effective it can be.

"I live here and now", you may say and you are right. But how can you define now? Time is fleeting and so is now. Or as the saying goes: Today is yesterday's tomorrow. And if you only have a now, you would have no past and no future, no history and no hopes.

just think, finding your Way by understanding where you have been and how others influenced that journey. wouldn't it be exciting?

learn to slow down and find the things that are lost in the haste..... and those that have influenced you in your journey..... good and bad.