Gabe Lareau, 19, our featured “Bike-to-Work Week” blogger, says you shouldn’t let the rain get you down. Just keep peddling and channel your inner Pooh – you know, the silly old bear.
by Gabe Lareau
The weather in particular has gotten to me this week. I’m going to be completely honest: if it weren’t National Bike-to-Work Week, I don’t know if I would have ridden my bike at all.
Here in the QC, it has been wet, downcast, and dreary for almost five days now. Every bike ride I’ve done has been one where I make sure I’m in fast-drying synthetic athletic wear, I have water-locked my Apple Watch, and brought an extra pair of socks for when I get to work, usually sopping wet.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love biking in what is otherwise classified as “inclement” weather. On hot summer days, an afternoon rain in the middle of a bike ride never fails to be a welcomed event.
But, just like when a vacation is starting to reach its best-by date (?), the rainstorms everyday have steadily exhausted my determination and patience. And when that happens, I start to fret— “How will my leather Brooks saddle survive the downpour?” “What if one of the higher-up suits sees a lowly employee come to work soaked through his shirt?” “Are we absolutely one hundred percent sure the government doesn’t put mind-altering chemicals in the rainwater?”
Stay calm and ride on
Right now, I’m reading a book by Benjamin Hoff called The Tao of Pooh, wherein he details how A.A. Milne’s famous “Silly Old Bear” is actually a perfect lens in which to view the Eastern Taoist philosophy. A key point Hoff makes is, to better act like Winnie the Pooh and therefore practice Taoism in your daily life, you must take “Circumstances As They Are.”
Gabe Lareau, bike rider, camp counselor, and budding Taoist philosopher
You must ride along with the flow of the natural world that surrounds you. We, as bicyclists, are passive observers of nature—never interfering with Things As They Are, only riding along with them and embracing them as they first meet us in their uncompromised, natural form.
I’ve had to keep this concept at a top-of-mind awareness level as I’m riding, because it can be so easy to be disdainful of the condition of the roads, the ear-splitting volume of the cars, and the persistent rainy weather when you’re atop perhaps mankind’s finest invention.
It’s here where we insert the wisdom of the Taoists.
If we were to take the rain, the roads, the cars, heck even COVID-19, not as near-insurmountable barriers to overcome but instead as Things As They Are, they become much more easy to come to terms with and even find satisfaction in.
Here’s a monumentally profound insight: rain is a natural thing. From it arises new flowers that you will admire on your ride next week. It feeds the mighty river many of us ride along every single day. If it weren’t for the rain, I doubt I would’ve heard my beloved neighborhood birdsong a couple days ago. And if weather becomes a nuisance, accept that the natural order of rain dictates that it will evaporate off of your skin and you will once again be dry.
Taking Things As They Are in their natural state applies to almost everything. Yes, even a pandemic.
The Tao of Pooh
Despite what you might think, taking Things As They Are, does not equal complacency. To put it in bicycling terms, if a Taoist were at the foot of what will be a long, arduous climb up a long, arduous hill, their reaction wouldn’t be to sit at its foot for eternity because, “Ah yes, that is a hill and that’s just the Way Things Are.” Instead, their first action would be to mount the saddle and start the climb.
Acknowledging Things As They Are is not about accepting defeat. It is about doing the one thing that is in front of you and finding an inner peace in a natural state of something. Or, as Hoff illustrates, finding satisfaction by putting the square peg into the square hole. Whereas a clever cyclist may find satisfaction by way of an alternate, flatter route that may end up taking longer than the hill or an academically minded cyclist would sate his curiosity by asking exactly why this particular hill is hilly, a Tao-minded cyclist simply mounts and pedals. Or in a pandemic context: pandemics always end, for that is natural. But that doesn’t mean skip the vaccine. Seriously, get the vaccine.
So, whenever you find yourself frustrated by this pandemic, the rain, the hills, or maybe a displaced chain that you’ll have to grease up your fingers to fix, think about what Pooh and Taoists would do. (Side note: Pooh and the Taoists is an amazing band name, I give anyone reading this permission to use it.)
After all, that same Silly Old Bear is the one that also said, “You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.”
Keep riding. See you tomorrow.
The weather in particular has gotten to me this week. I’m going to be completely honest: if it weren’t National Bike-to-Work Week, I don’t know if I would have ridden my bike at all.
Here in the QC, it has been wet, downcast, and dreary for almost five days now. Every bike ride I’ve done has been one where I make sure I’m in fast-drying synthetic athletic wear, I have water-locked my Apple Watch, and brought an extra pair of socks for when I get to work, usually sopping wet.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love biking in what is otherwise classified as “inclement” weather. On hot summer days, an afternoon rain in the middle of a bike ride never fails to be a welcomed event.
But, just like when a vacation is starting to reach its best-by date (?), the rainstorms everyday have steadily exhausted my determination and patience. And when that happens, I start to fret— “How will my leather Brooks saddle survive the downpour?” “What if one of the higher-up suits sees a lowly employee come to work soaked through his shirt?” “Are we absolutely one hundred percent sure the government doesn’t put mind-altering chemicals in the rainwater?”
Stay calm and ride on
Right now, I’m reading a book by Benjamin Hoff called The Tao of Pooh, wherein he details how A.A. Milne’s famous “Silly Old Bear” is actually a perfect lens in which to view the Eastern Taoist philosophy. A key point Hoff makes is, to better act like Winnie the Pooh and therefore practice Taoism in your daily life, you must take “Circumstances As They Are.”
Gabe Lareau, bike rider, camp counselor, and budding Taoist philosopher
You must ride along with the flow of the natural world that surrounds you. We, as bicyclists, are passive observers of nature—never interfering with Things As They Are, only riding along with them and embracing them as they first meet us in their uncompromised, natural form.
I’ve had to keep this concept at a top-of-mind awareness level as I’m riding, because it can be so easy to be disdainful of the condition of the roads, the ear-splitting volume of the cars, and the persistent rainy weather when you’re atop perhaps mankind’s finest invention.
It’s here where we insert the wisdom of the Taoists.
If we were to take the rain, the roads, the cars, heck even COVID-19, not as near-insurmountable barriers to overcome but instead as Things As They Are, they become much more easy to come to terms with and even find satisfaction in.
Here’s a monumentally profound insight: rain is a natural thing. From it arises new flowers that you will admire on your ride next week. It feeds the mighty river many of us ride along every single day. If it weren’t for the rain, I doubt I would’ve heard my beloved neighborhood birdsong a couple days ago. And if weather becomes a nuisance, accept that the natural order of rain dictates that it will evaporate off of your skin and you will once again be dry.
Taking Things As They Are in their natural state applies to almost everything. Yes, even a pandemic.
The Tao of Pooh
Despite what you might think, taking Things As They Are, does not equal complacency. To put it in bicycling terms, if a Taoist were at the foot of what will be a long, arduous climb up a long, arduous hill, their reaction wouldn’t be to sit at its foot for eternity because, “Ah yes, that is a hill and that’s just the Way Things Are.” Instead, their first action would be to mount the saddle and start the climb.
Acknowledging Things As They Are is not about accepting defeat. It is about doing the one thing that is in front of you and finding an inner peace in a natural state of something. Or, as Hoff illustrates, finding satisfaction by putting the square peg into the square hole. Whereas a clever cyclist may find satisfaction by way of an alternate, flatter route that may end up taking longer than the hill or an academically minded cyclist would sate his curiosity by asking exactly why this particular hill is hilly, a Tao-minded cyclist simply mounts and pedals. Or in a pandemic context: pandemics always end, for that is natural. But that doesn’t mean skip the vaccine. Seriously, get the vaccine.
So, whenever you find yourself frustrated by this pandemic, the rain, the hills, or maybe a displaced chain that you’ll have to grease up your fingers to fix, think about what Pooh and Taoists would do. (Side note: Pooh and the Taoists is an amazing band name, I give anyone reading this permission to use it.)
After all, that same Silly Old Bear is the one that also said, “You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.”
Keep riding. See you tomorrow.
For more on this topic ...
You can read all of Gabe's articles in his exclusive series for Let's Move QC:
- A lifetime of riding can take you places - Gabe shares his love for cycling and perspective on the benefits of biking to work and the issues surrounding local cycling routes.
- The joys and sorrows of urban biking - Gabe talks about the hazards cyclists face when they have to share the road with cars.
- The secret to staying sane when biking in the rain - Gabe says you shouldn't let the rain get you down. Just keep peddling and channel your inner Pooh - you know, the silly old bear.
- Them's the breaks - Gabe shares his tips for keeping your bike-rides safe and trouble-free (even if you have to make an occassional repair on the road).
Recent Comments