In Praise of the Bicycle Workday

By Todd J. Sukol

I recently found this piece of writing in my journal from 2010. At the time I had just started Do More Mission and was experimenting with working all over DC metro from my bicycle. Laptop and cell phone in tow, I worked my way around various parts of the city, Rock Creek Park, the burbs, etc., stopping for 30-90 minutes at a time to work in the woods, in urban parks, at coffee shops, on street corners, benches and grassy fields. It was surprisingly productive and utterly exhilarating. This approach went by the wayside as a team began to emerge around me and the gravitational pull of “the office” got stronger. While physical proximity is important, the sheer physicality and spontaneity of this approach was incredible. I think I’ll book a day of working from my bicycle again sometime this fall. Have a great weekend, all!

From Monday 9/13/2010: I so love riding my bicycle, a passport out of sedentary life. I hop on and within seconds my heart is pumping, my respiration on the rise and my leg muscles cranking. Even my upper body gets its share. I am rocked out of mental slumber and into conscious, alert attention. I am awake.

Before long I’m moving at a speed that makes for a certain safety risk. The cars, the curbs, the protruding roots, the potholes, the gravel, the rocks. All these wonderfully looming assailants give thrill! Be it a country or a city riding day, there are always dangerous things to be aware of. So many things at once popping up without notice. How glorious it is to finally have a productive use for this busy brain of mine! While cranking along in this dangerous domain, having attention everywhere all at once is decidedly an asset. What in other contexts would be called “attention deficit” is suddenly a valuable survival skill. With body and mind fully occupied, my soul can finally relax. I am clear.

I become aware that my movement forward is propelled by a unique partnership between my own physical exertion and this very specialized machine. The modern bicycle may be sophisticated in the design and engineering that guided its evolution, but it’s operation is so simpe that it seems almost primal in our microchip and genome moment in history. At a time when the world seems split between those who worship science at the expense of beauty and those who scorn progress at the expense of true soul, this bicycle is my refuge. It is both machine and nature, modern and authentic, powerful and simple. Today I am neither overly dependent on technology nor pretending to be self-reliant. Partnering with this simple, brilliant machine, I am participating.

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Creating Meaning

Usually when we ask the question, “Why?” we are looking backward, searching for causation. While there is value in understanding how we ended up where we are, most of the time there are too many variables to definitively decipher repeatable recipes for our current triumphs or predicaments.

But what if we are looking in the wrong direction? The Hebrew word for “why?,” which is “lama?” (sounds like “llama”), points us to a forward looking version of the question “Why?” The Hebrew word “lama?” can be thought of as a contraction of the prefix “l’…,” which means “to” or “toward,” and the interrogative word “what?.” In other words, the Hebrew language is suggesting that when we ask the pervasive, very human question “Why?” we ought to be directing our thinking toward the future, not the past. Don’t ask “From where did this come?” Ask instead “To where do I take this?”

Taken together, perhaps, the Parable of the Chinese Farmer and the ancient wisdom of the Hebrew language are directing us to respond to the vicissitudes of live by devoting ourselves to creating meaning through creative purpose. Purpose, or meaning, is not something we merely attempt to decipher. It is something we are responsible to create, perhaps in partnership with the Divine. Whether we confront tragedy, anxiety or triumph, we are challenged to direct our pain, our pride, our talents and our struggles toward making the world something closer to what we believe it can and should be. What would happen if our way of celebrating success, mourning loss and managing uncertainty all consisted of a new kind of “Why?” What if we responded to life’s every conquest, concussion and curve-ball by asking “What am I supposed to do with this? How do I make it matter?”