Working in Movement

Remember when you were learning how to ride a bicycle? It was probably pretty hard to balance yourself at first, and you had to think about it a lot. But then one day things kind of clicked and you found the joy of riding and not having to think about it too much.

It's the same learning most actions; athletic, performing arts stuff, or whatever. You think that you have to think about, but soon the conscious thinking gets in the way of your executing the action. Thinking too much can really throw off the precise timing and coordination needed to do many athletic and performance things.

In Five Seconds on a Mountain Pass - Daily Peloton bicycle racer Dana Albert beautifully writes about this sort of thing applied to riding a bicycle down a steep grade a high speeds. Albert refers to acting without consciously thinking about it as autonomic:

What do I mean by autonomic? I’m using the term loosely, not in the sense of the autonomic nervous system, but to suggest automatic, spontaneous action that seems to skip the conscious mind altogether.

He explores this idea in a little depth, and then describes his experience of witnessing a friend's almost out of control descent of a steep grade. Luckily, the friend's bike stabilized before there was any trouble, and he rode on like nothing had happened.

One of Albert's phrases sticks with me: Intent is not the same as ability.

If I were rationally convinced that my love of speed were a real menace to my family, I would take steps to avoid the steep stuff. But I differentiate between caution alone and overall safety: I believe that the expert descender, though he goes faster, subjects himself to no more danger than a cautious novice. The expert understands the hazards he may encounter and how to handle them; doesn’t get distracted; doesn’t panic. The cautious novice may get scared and brake when it isn’t appropriate (e.g., in a curve), or may brake too hard, skidding the rear tire or flipping over the bars. Intent is not the same as ability.

Intent alone is not enough when applied to skill: it takes real and spontaneous experience to progress to mastery of anything. To want to be able to do it is important, but real mastery takes experience, and lots of it.