Bike Snob - Anonymous [52]
Now that the brain doesn’t have to spend its time agonizing over whether or not it’s okay to open another bag of Barbecue Ruffles, it can actually start to do what it’s supposed to, which is help you order your life. Any cyclist will tell you that one of the things they value most about cycling is what it does for their heads. It cleans out the clutter. Cycling allows for reflection. It simultaneously offers time to mull over problems and to escape those problems. It’s both meditative and contemplative. Whether you’re weaving through traffic or climbing a long country road, the effect is the same. Your body’s working, and your mind is working. And when those two things start working in concert, other aspects of life can start falling into place too.
The absolute truth about cycling—and the very best thing about it, better even than the speed and mobility—is the fact that it can be a key to fulfillment as powerful as any religion, psychoactive drug, or therapist. However, there are two reasons you never hear this:
1. Anti-veloism
As I said, “society” (aka “The Man”) is prejudiced against cycling. It’s kid’s stuff, or at best it’s a competitive sport in which the athletes wear skintight clothing. Certainly no spiritual truth can be divined from it, right? Wrong. Cycling can be just as physically and spiritually beneficial as yoga. Plus, swamis’ clothes are easily as ridiculous as those of the cyclist, yet nobody has trouble believing they can help you attain spiritual fulfillment. One day soon, the cyclist’s Technicolor Lycra skinsuits will be considered just as spiritual as a holy man’s robes—though hopefully the cyclist will have the decency to don a robe over the skinsuit when off the bike.
2. It’s Fun
Things that are fun aren’t supposed to be worthwhile. Moreover, people don’t want you to enjoy yourself, and that’s because they’re not enjoying themselves. They’re more important than you, remember? That’s why the traffic-addled driver honks at you. Because cycling’s fun, people don’t think it warrants the passion and enthusiasm cyclists have for it. Even people who love cycling get defensive about it. They say it’s just a hobby. But cycling is less a hobby than it is a discipline with the potential to transform you. It brings balance. It’s also a form of personal expression, like playing music, or writing or painting. It’s a way of seeing the world, and it’s as enriching as any of those things can be. It can even be an art form. A cycling victory can be inspiring. You can’t really say that about coin collecting.
Also, it’s easy to forget how much mental energy you expend simply figuring out the world on a daily basis. The cultural landscape is complicated. It’s filled with products and references and technology. For example, it’s nice that you can now go to a supermarket and choose from any number of healthy options, but at the same time the cereal aisle alone, with all its movie, TV, and toy tie-ins, is probably brimming with more cultural references than the entire nineteenth century. It would be enough to knock even the most cerebral Victorian clean off his penny-farthing! We spend most of our lives immersed in marketing campaigns. Ads have become so sophisticated we don’t even know we’re seeing them anymore. We can also learn anything we want to know about anything in about nineteen