...one month and counting...

One month. One month to Silverman #3. My third Silverman, my third full distance triathlon, my third 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike and 26.2 mile run in one day. Sometimes I wonder if it gets harder the more I do it. I know what to expect – I know what’s coming around the corner and just over the hill – the dark, early, cold morning, the swallowed watered in my belly, the choppy waters, the rough road, the relentless hills, and the hill to come after those, the sore butt, the tired eyes, the upset stomach…the beautiful sunrise, the glow of red rock, the smooth road, the encouragements of fellow athletes and the most supportive volunteers I’ve ever known, the faces of loved ones along the road, the sight of my dad conquering the course beside me, the prolific thoughts that float through my mind, the wind carrying energy, the aid stations full of nourishment, the fresh air, the silence, the sunset, the patter of feet, the glow, the overwhelming sense of accomplishment…and what is it that we are accomplishing? We could swim 2.4 miles, bike 112 miles, and run 26.2 miles any day. But this moment that will take place on November 11, 2007 will be a moment like any other in the fact that it is as unique as any other. All the bits and pieces, all those involved – organizers, volunteers, athletes, sponsors, spectators – together, they, we create and bring about this phenomenal event. With one missing it becomes another event. It’s difficult to locate a single wave in the ocean, but without that single wave, it’s a different ocean. This may be my third Silverman, but I have no doubt that it will be a different Silverman and one just as fantastic and exceptional as the other two.

The Beauty Full Art of Aging

“The finest workers in stone are not copper or steel tools, but the gentle touches of air and water working at the leisure with a liberal allowance of time.” - a quote by Henry David Thoreau I saw posted at Bryce Canyon National Park. It’s a loaded quote touching on many themes of art, time, wind, subtle change, patience, enjoyment, and so much more. While Thoreau is talking about the beauty and the masterpieces of art that are found on this Earth that have been created over many human lifetimes, it concerns all forms of art.

Any masterpiece does not happen overnight. It is a process that consists of many hours, dedication, sacrifice, growth, evolution, development and sometimes even discomfort. I cannot help but think how this relates to the human body as well, and what a masterpiece it is. I get saddened by the numerous advertisements for “looking and feeling young,” and the growing popularity and commonality of plastic surgery for the “perfect” look. To me nothing is more beautiful than the minds and bodies of those in their later ages. The face of someone in their 70s, 80s, or even later is so full of wisdom, life and stories. Every crease, every line, and every muscle has taken years to form and develop into such a fine detail and each is full of information and beauty.

How beautiful is that – to be touched with years of life. It was a pleasure to celebrate this beautiful art as my grandmother just turned 80. Happy Birthday Bedstemor!

- Becky Meldrum

The Ultimate Tool

Sometimes I wonder how I can make a difference in this large world, but as I was reading Mitch Thrower’s The Power of Thought in my last issue of Triathlete, I was reminded that in this world of technologies and gadgets, there is still only one ultimate tool that lets us create our reality and make our life be what we want it to be - our brain. Between our ears, we have thousands of thoughts that occur throughout the day. As Mitch points out, according to the National Science Foundation, people think anywhere from 12,000 – 50,000 thoughts per day!! He asks: “what will you do with this new superpower?”

This is what I’ll do with this superpower – I’m going to continue to have numerous thoughts circulating, but learn how to gather the positive and beneficial thoughts. I’m not going to clear my mind of thoughts, but instead use meditation to focus on certain thoughts that bring peace, joy and community to this world. I’m also going to protect this superpower – I’m going to feed it good food, good thoughts, exercise it, and provide a clean home for it, which means I must also protect my environment, my body, and my essence.

What are you going to do?

Worth the Walk?

"Was it Worth the Walk?"

I was asked this question as I neared the end of a hike to Delicate Arch in Arches National Park.

Isn’t the walk itself worth the walk? Why does there have to be something at the end to make it “worth it?” What about the beauty along the trail, along the way to get “there.” Yes, Delicate Arch is a spectacular sight and one worth seeing, but it’s the icing on the cake.

I hope I get to the end of my life and say, “it was worth the walk.” I’m not expecting anything spectacular the day I die. In fact, I already know it has been worth the walk. But I’m not about to stop. I’ll keep on keeping on. There’s so much to see, so much to do. Some of it’s icing, some of it’s filling, some of it is not so sweet and perhaps a little bitter, but all in all, it’s all rather tasty and I'm not one to turn down a bite of cake!

Quiet in the Sky

I have finally jumped out of a plane! Being one of the few Soul Acrobats who has never done it, it was about time! But I didn’t just jump – I tasted the crisp, clean air found at 10,000 feet, I bathed in sunlight that has yet to reach the surface of the earth, I floated above the ground watching the happenings of the city below and was reminded of the days I used to set up Playmobile cities with my brother and sisters, I landed so softly on the Earth after falling at speeds reaching 125mph, I could have been strolling over the soft sand found on Maui’s beaches!! On April 29th, I was flying without an airplane and with much calmer nerves than when I am in an airplane!!

The whole experience was not at all what I expected. Most of my expectations lay around fear and not knowing, but it turns out that fear was probably what I experienced least. Yes, I was afraid and even thinking of it now, I get nervous, but it seems that sometimes, when you’re in the right place at the right time with the right people, your fears become replaced by awe, anticipation, excitement, trust, and just the overall feeling of life! And maybe that’s the part of fear that we like and what keeps thrill seekers coming back. Yes, there’s fear, but when combined with all these other feelings, it can be overcome, which then makes the feeling of accomplishment and success over something you have feared, feel that much greater!

All in all, I think my first, and certainly not least, skydiving experience was a good reminder to not rush things to happen. What struck me most, was the calm and the quiet I experienced and how great the whole moment felt. I’m sure I would have enjoyed skydiving whenever I would have done it, but I really think it all happened at the right moment. When you know you have things you want to do or accomplish, don’t rush to make them happen. Take the necessary steps so you’re ready and so you can be successful, and then be patient for the right time. When things happen at the right time, you feel it – it’s those moments when everything feels lined up, available, and that the world and its opportunities are at your finger tips!

I leave you with this thought: have you ever seen a rainbow from the other side? Me neither, but I will. It’s a different world up there and I look forward to exploring it further.

Happy World Health Day!

Today, April 7th, is World Health Day. This year the theme is “international health security.” We live in a globalized world and people around the world are vulnerable to new and rapidly spreading health risks that know no boundaries. These health issues can greatly impact the collective security of people around the world.

I believe the easiest and most efficient way each person can contribute to reducing these global health risks is by simply taking care of his or her own personal health. When you are healthy and have a strong immune system, you are more likely to avoid getting sick, which in turn, keeps you from passing sickness on to others. To make our world a healthier place, you have to start with yourself.

So on this World Health Day, think about the ways to make your life healthier; add a few fruits and vegetables to your diet, drink more water, go for a walk after dinner. Maybe, today is the day to commit to quitting smoking or to sign up for the local 5k you have always wanted to do. Take a few moments to focus your energy on international health and then be thankful for your own health. Whatever it is, realize that when you improve your own health, you are helping improve the health of those around you and around the world.

- Becky

Evolution of Gymnastics in My Life

When my parents put me in gymnastics at a young age, I’m pretty sure a goal of theirs was for me to learn motor skills and body awareness. At the age of 3 and a ½, I believe the gym was a great environment in which I could safely learn to move my body and play. Then, as I got older and my skill level increased, I learned to perform for a judge to get a score. Looking back, club gymnastics felt very individualistic as it was just me on the beam or the floor fighting for the best score I could get – always wanting to qualify to the next level and the next competition. At that point, I had learned how to move my body and perform for a score.

Then came college gymnastics; what seemed to me to be an entirely new sport. I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to compete on the Stanford Women’s Gymnastics team for four years and that is exactly what it was – a team sport. No longer was it just me up on the beam, but I had the whole team right there backing me up. And it wasn’t just my teammates standing alongside the beam, but all the Stanford gymnasts who had come before. It was about legacy. I had all their energy supporting me and helping me to do my best, and I was performing for them and for all our fans in the stands. In college gymnastics, I started to learn about shared experiences and shared energy between the team and our fans and me. I pulled energy from my teammates and from the crowd to enhance my own performance while simultaneously giving energy back. I had learned to use the surrounding energy in order to move my body and to perform for a score for not only me, but for the team and for all of Stanford.

Today, as a professional acrobat, the sport of gymnastics continues to personally evolve for me. I continue to build on the skills I have learned throughout my career, learning to move within and around my environment in acrobatic and artistic ways and pulling energy from the audience to strengthen my performance in order to give them greater energy in return. Now, however, I’m performing five nights a week for strangers and there is no score. Now I know that performing means enjoying the moment, enjoying the energy I receive from the audience, and enjoying the energy I create for the audience in return.

I look back at my early gymnastics career and even my collegiate gymnastics career and wish I could go back and do it again. It is not that I did not enjoy it, but I just did not know how to enjoy the actual moment. I did not know how to just trust what I had trained to do and let the moment happen in competition. Of course, it is easy to say this now, but then again, perhaps I would not even be at this point now, if I had not gone through all the other steps to get here. Maybe, the fact that I do get to perform every night, instead of just a few times a year, I feel I can relax and enjoy the moments. Maybe I would not even know how to use the energy of the audience if I had not first learned to perform for myself to better myself. Maybe, I am still doing exactly what I did when I first started gymnastics – testing the body and its limits and finding new ways to move in my environment. Just imagine what I will be able to do in another 20 years!!

Facing Freedom

Throughout history, humanity has been faced with various challenges around the issues of freedom and liberty. However, these challenges and barriers can and have been overcome. We must continue to search for ways to train and condition our bodies and minds to create our environment. We can build new paths by demonstrating precise movement as a way to travel through life. We can escape and dodge barriers by using them as bridges, not blockades. We can bend limits, brave the shackles of conformity, and evolve the body to its limits by continuing to challenge the abilities of the mind and its body. Just as humans have been defining and evolving freedom on a global scale, our movements and our thoughts define our own personal freedoms.

How do we move on from the challenges humans have faced? How do we continue to grow and evolve as a species and as an individual? Are the restrictions and responsibilities of freedom similar to the responsibilities found in the art of free-running? Perhaps the lessons of physical and mental challenges learned from free-running can relate directly to global movement and the possibility of peace.

Moving through your Environment

This past weekend we started working on our newest project, a film on free-running. As we start exploring this form of urban athletics, we are intrigued by the art of this increasingly popular sport in which the participants explore and move through their environment in innovative and aesthetically pleasing ways. Free-runners often perform in urban settings, flying and leaping to and from buildings, railings, steps and any other object that most passersby will observe as an impossible prop in which to move from one location to another.

Despite the suggestion of the name, free-running requires the free-runner to have an acute awareness of his body and his environment. He cannot just run absent-mindedly from one position to another without being focused and making choices. Every time a free-runner jumps, he has choices to make; which direction will he go? How will he land? Where will he move to next? These choices must be made quickly, which means his thoughts need to be clear. We often have many thoughts competing for our attention, so it is vital for a free-runner to know what he wants and to follow through with his choice. Otherwise, he can end up being injured or causing destruction to the environment.

Just as all freedoms come with responsibility, so does the art of free-running. The free-runner has a responsibility to listen to and respect both his body and the environment. Whether he is jumping on rocks or buildings, communication must exist to prevent damage to either the body or the environment. If he does not respect the land, the rock can bite the free-runner. If the land does not respect the free-runner, the free-runner can destroy the rock. People shape the land by treading and jumping, but instead of working against the environment, the free-runner must run free with respect to it. He must land lightly to slowly mold his surroundings into a compatible environment without completely destroying or changing it. To achieve this compatible environment, listening must occur by both the free-runner and the environment. By listening, we can shape our bodies and our environment and then we can slowly mold and create an environment of a new light that respects the relationship between our bodies and the environment.

For the next couple months, we will continue to explore the world of urban athletics and free-running by filming and documenting members of the French troupe, Fils du Vide. Join us in this exploration of our environments by discovering your own new and creative ways in which to move through your surroundings while still respecting them.

-Becky, Soul Acrobat

Waiting versus Patience

When I first participated in Silverman, a full distance triathlon, in November 2005, I was fortunate enough to have “perfect” conditions. By perfect conditions, I mean the sun was out, the temperature felt just right, and most importantly, there was absolutely no wind to battle on the swim, bike, or run.

This year, I participated in Silverman again and I was counting on these “perfect” conditions. During my training, I would think to myself how the race was over for me if there was going to be any wind, because with even the slightest breeze, I felt like I could barely move on the bike. I kept thinking of last year’s race and that “perfect” weather would be in store again. Every time I woke up to the wind howling outside my window, all I wanted to do was stay curled up in bed and wait for the perfect riding weather to arrive. Of course, I ultimately knew that race day weather was an unknown and in order to prepare for this unknown, I had to train hard through these cold, windy days. So, as much as I wanted to stay in bed these cool, gusty mornings, I took that first step out of bed and then onto my bike in order to tackle the wind. The wind was the obstacle I had to conquer in order to feel prepared for the unknown weather that could occur race day, and it took patience of both mind and body to train through the windy days. I wanted perfect conditions, but I knew I could not just wait for the windy days to pass during my training. I needed patience of both mind and body in order to be best prepared for the unknown weather for Silverman 2006.

The idea of having the patience to work through the unknowns of race day instead of just waiting for the perfect day to come relate directly to every day life. Challenges and obstacles constantly try to block us in the process of reaching our goals and we often find ourselves in situations and places we never expected to be. However, when these challenges do occur we must continue to explore the boundaries, delve through the barriers, and discover new paths to take. We must have patience with our mind and our body to explore and learn the way to break through the barriers and to work through the challenges before us. We cannot just wait for our perfect day or our perfect dream to come about; we must personally take the initiative to move through the process to get there. Conditions are not always perfect but this does not mean that you do not try and you do not perform.

Likewise, if you just wait for the end to come, you end up missing the process and the journey to get to your goal. By having patience of mind and body to work through challenges, when you finally do meet your goals and your dreams, you can fully appreciate the journey it took to achieve your goal. Silverman 2006 ended up being one the windiest days I had seen. The water was choppy on the swim and the bike had 50 miles of headwind. Yes, it was hard, but because I had had the patience to work through the windy days during my training, I was confidant on race day that I could handle the wind. And I did. With these “bad” weather conditions, I ended up beating my previous year’s time (which occurred during “perfect” conditions) by over an hour and twenty minutes. Patience with mind and body while tackling obstacles in my course enabled me to reach my goal of finishing my second full distance triathlon at a time much faster than my first. I am sure that had I just waited for the perfect days to come during my training, I would have done much more poorly. But I had not waited. I had patience and ended up enjoying the entire journey to finish the way I did.

So, why do people wait? Why do people wait for their goals and dreams to just happen. Is it because of fear? Fear of change? Fear of breaking away from comforts? Is it fear of the unknown? Perhaps these are valid fears, but I believe that having the courage to be patient during hard times can get you through the challenges. In the words of Rollo May, “courage is not the absence of despair, but rather, the capacity to move ahead in spite of despair.” Don’t wait for an unknown tomorrow. Have the courage to make the unknowns possible by tackling them today with perseverance and patience.

-Becky Meldrum, Triathlete, Soul Acrobat

Finding Love in a World Where Hate Makes the Headlines

Watching the news and reading the newspaper, I often find that accounts of hate, abhorrence and/or crime seem to make the headlines while stories of love and unity are seldom the focal point of news-reporting media. It seems that prime time could be called crime time, and I question if it has become impossible for love to become more popular than the negative accounts that are so popularly reported. However, at this time of year, we also begin to get overwhelmed with images of hearts and chocolate and roses as Valentine’s Day is right around the corner. While many see February 14th as a bit of a Hallmark holiday, I believe it is still an important holiday because of the simple idea that it celebrates love, and perhaps, for just one day, love can take the limelight.

During this season of valentines and roses, I encourage you to help keep love in the spotlight by celebrating the many forms of love that exist. For example, celebrate the wonderful love for a significant other while also honoring the love you have for your mother. Take pleasure in doing what you love, whether it is painting or riding your bike. Associate yourself with objects you adore, such as dogs or flowers. Even though people can distinguish between these different forms of love, I like to think that they are simply all a form of positive energy that is felt from deep within the soul. When you do something you really enjoy or share a moment with someone for whom you care deeply, this energy is released and a union is experienced. Love then, as a union of energy felt between people or between people and objects or activities, can spread.

This February 14th, you can do your part to release love into this world by keeping it simple. Celebrate love by doing something that releases that warm glow of energy from deep within your soul and then share that experience with someone; read a book out loud with a person who shares your dreams, turn off your TV and dance to the music, give a rose (or even just a smile) to a stranger on the street. Share your love with someone else and in return, savor the love that someone shares with you. If we all release just a little bit of love into this world and openly receive love that is given to us, perhaps we will find that it is possible for love to become the center of our attention.

-Becky Meldrum, Soul Acrobat

Soul Acrobats

So what really is a Soul Acrobat? We know what an acrobat is – we think of somebody doing circus, doing flips. When I think of an acrobat I think of somebody with agility, skill, and coordination. When I think of soul, it’s about your essence, your spirit, your mind, it’s about all the intangible things that make us up, that make us human. When we put soul and acrobats together, it’s about the ability to manifest your essence, who you truly are. It’s about living your purpose by living on your edge, just like as acrobats we’re always pushing ourselves to try a new move.

- Alvin.