Today, I had fun.
For the past few years, whenever I’ve gone on a bike ride, I’ve been goal focused.
Mountain biking: distance and elevation. Have I pushed myself hard enough?
Road biking: speed. Have I kept up a high enough average pace? How many people have passed me? How many did I pass?
Today: cruising around on my city bike, in no hurry, the scenery is great, isn’t it? Stop at the wine store, buy a few nice bottles, cruise around through the neighborhoods, look at the mountains, cruise past the river to see all the people having fun in the water.
I haven’t had that much fun in years.
Ok, well, I admit – I have had some fun moments on my mountain bike, cruising around the great trails here.
But the point is the same: it was refreshing to drop the goal orientation, and just…. ride.
This isn’t a biking blog – I previously wrote plenty about that at cycle9.com. This holds a deeper lesson.
Somewhere along the way, I, and many others, lost sight of the “fun” and got caught up in the “achievement” and “goals.”
What’s up with that?
Goals and achievement are good, in moderation.
Yet life is a lot more than that. Life is here to be enjoyed. To be experienced. To have fun with.
Ours may be an overreaction against the freewheeling 60’s.
It’s one whopper of an overreaction.
It’s time to get fun oriented again. We all deserve it.