Rough Terrain & Rest Days
What does it take to be a community?
What does it mean to make a commitment?
These are the questions that I pondered as we went up and down, over and over on the Continental Divide. Yesterday was our hardest day of riding so far, in terms of energy output. I feel that our Bikemovement community needed a day like this. It gives us a new appreciation for the usual terrain—pavement, which is a smoother, faster ride.
We all said at one point that we were committed to taking the gravel road, no matter how hard it was going to be. By the end of the day however, there were differential opinions about our choice. One member of the group really was broken down. Others had one of the best day of riding of the trip so far. If we had known at the beginning what the end result would be, would we have made the same choice? I believe that it depends on how we see our community, and what it means when our community makes a commitment to each other.
Overall, I believe that the few painful experiences we have had as Bikemovement could have been mitigated by each individual in the group being more honest with the rest of the community about how they were doing, and where they were coming from. Then the group can make a more adequate decision about how to continue in our movement. When a member of the group is feeling sick, or not taking care of themselves, the rest of the group wants to surround them with love and “you can do it!” encouragement. If the group is not fully informed about what is going on, it is easy to make an inaccurate decision about how to encourage or to hold that person accountable. In other words, it is hard to make the call about commitment within community.Today is a day where we can all think individually about issues like this (individual and community, accountability) as well as much more. It is our second rest day. Members took it easy and relaxed, wrote, read and visited the lake and local forest fire. This was also an opportunity to have sensitive individual conversations with people that are difficult to have when all the group is present, because non-exclusivity is a group value, and we don’t want to siphon off into cliques. We know we need each other, and we need each other to feel well. We are in the process of sharing our stories. Today, Sarah and Teresa shared. These stories continue to help us grow into who we want to be as individuals and as members of a movement community.
Right now, most of the group is standing still and very hot. You see, we don’t usually stand still. We are standing around the food bin, digging through the massive conglomeration of carbohydrates, protein, sugar, and sodium. Since people have to feed themselves today, instead of the organized lunch period, we are somewhat at a loss for organization. It is also difficult to know what and how much to eat when we are not biking. Eating at our normal rate feels waaaay over the top on the rest days. Nonetheless, we are a good group for jokes. We laugh at our silliness and our mistakes. I would guess that we spend most of the time off of our bikes laughing. We are also working hard on the issues we are trying to tackle, such as the three questions posed at the beginning of this journal entry. Rest days are fabulous because they nurture both the individual and the community.~ Sarah