#9 — Is this what BMWMotorrad means with: Make life a ride?
Riding a motorcycle is a tangible essence of freedom with the blessed serenity of a cleared mind. Without a doubt more rewarding than the risk.
When motorcycling, you understand that your mortality is an inescapable truth. It dawns on you that your time is finite.
Yet, you accept the risk that comes with two wheels. You are more exposed and vulnerable. As you travel on a motorcycle, your surroundings do not simply hurtle past without meaning.
Instead, you feel a sense of belonging — you are somehow actively engaged as part of a living landscape. When riding a motorcycle you feel engaged with life, instead of being on the outside looking at the world passing by. You are no longer just a spectator. Acceleration on two wheels can intoxicate you. A force delivered in such a visceral way, that it is nothing like what you experience in any ordinary form of transport. That instant pull of force on your arms as you grasp onto the handlebars. Your legs squeezing onto the fuel tank, as the wind is trying to through you overboard. The violent noise of the engine, aggressive acceleration and the wind racing against your chest while the revs meter hits the red… you must remain calm. Your heart rate steady, your grip on the throttle relaxed and gentle. Your life depends on you being in control. Quite similar to life.
You must always be calm and gentle with your inputs that control your surrounding energy.
It is here, in this place of focus, where I find motorcycling gives us its greatest gift. A place set aside from all the thrills and sensations your body is being subjected to as you ride. A place where riding your motorcycle, by necessity, brings your mind and soul into the present moment. A place where you can neither muse over the past nor worry about the future ahead.
Motorcycling can shift your mind to a position of singular purpose, taking you away from the distractions that modern life throws at us.
