While pilfering through my quotes for today’s quote of the day, I knew I struck inspirational gold when I came across this one by Claude Pepper. Mr. Pepper was a Harvard Law school graduate, taught law, practiced law in Miami Beach, Coral Gables, and Tallahassee, Fla., as well as in Washington, D.C. . He capped it all off by serving as a Senator and Representative from the beautiful state of Florida.
He’s the sort of person who, when speaking, the rest of us would do well to lean in and listen.
I’m leaning.
I’ve never thought about life in terms of riding a bicycle, but I’ll be danged if he isn’t right. If you’ve ever taught a child to ride a bike, you know that all is usually fine until they stop peddaling, for whatever reason. It’s pretty much the same with swimming – if you stop treading or kicking, there’s no place left to go but down.
As an adult (I’m not sure I EVER actually got tired as a child), there’ve been times on a bike that every muscle in my body wanted to just stop. My legs will begin pleading with my brain… stop, for crying out loud, we can’t go any further! But my brain somehow musters up the energy and ability to reason to reply, “If I stop, we go down… is that what you want?!”
We all trudge on until we make it safely to the carport and THEN safely stop.
Sometimes “keeping on” is simply a response to being unable to stop.
Sometimes it’s the same with life, isn’t it? Even when we’re tired….even when we’re broken-hearted or our spirit has been stripped bare….even when we’re sick – we have to dig deep and find a way to keep going. Because if we stop, we’re going to drop and, unlike cats, we don’t always land on our feet.
The dread, the descent, the deterioration, the drop, and the downfall can all be found in the same place – the very spot you discontinue.
Just keep on going. It really doesn’t matter if you feel like it or not. Find a way, make a way – and if that way lets you down, find another. When dog-tired, on a bicycle, I think of it as “finding a new gear.” I think the same can pretty much be applied to life.
If the one you’re in is failing you… find a new gear. Then keep going.