Mindfulness In Action

My son looooooves skateboarding and so for the biggest treat of his life, we went to the men's street skateboarding Olympics in Paris this summer on our way back from visiting family in Italy.  

It was the first time I had ever been to the Olympics.  Growing up, we always watched the Olympics on TV.  My mother was a trained alpine exercise instructor and a big supporter of sports--she loved watching young athletes fulfill their potential.  And my dad was a natural athlete and loved watching the Olympics as well.  

They would have been so excited for us that we were actually going to an Olympic event!  

But "there's many a slip twixt the cup and the lip."  

To start off with, tickets for the skateboarding event were really hard to get.  They got snatched up as soon as they were released online.  Fortunately, my wife was very determined.  

Then, right before our train ride into Paris, we discovered that three out of the four major train lines into Paris had been sabotaged.  But not our line!

On the morning of the event, we were about get on the metro to the skatepark when we got a message saying the event was rescheduled till after our Paris stay due to rain.  So we extended our stay.

Finally, two days later, it was a beautiful sunny day and we got into the Olympic skateboarding venue to watch the competition.    

Wow were those guys good!  The scorching sun was no match for the excitement on the course in front of us.  

Right before the finals, the men were practicing their tricks and I got some amazing photos of the athletes, including Jagger Eaton, the American who won the Silver medal.  

Fun stuff, but what does all this have to do with mindfulness and meditation?  

You HAVE to be in the moment to skateboard at an Olympic level.  The kinds of jumps and twists and "blind" slides off of rails and other obstacles they were doing were incredible.  If they got carried away by even a single thought while speeding along on hard concrete, it meant almost certain pain.

We can learn from those skateboarders and for that matter, the top athletes in any sport.  Present moment awareness is what they practice day in and day out.  Being mindful doesn't mean you need to move slowly.  With practice, you can be mindful even at high speeds.

If athletes allow themselves to dwell on their past failures, think about their past successes, or get lost in worries or fantasies about the future, their attention slips away from this very moment and they can fall or fail quickly.  This is the moment where life is happening and where potential lies.  Not that moment.  This moment.  

Not only do top athletes need to be present-moment oriented, but to make it to the Olympics, they have to work super hard, and be committed, patient and resilient.  The skateboarders we saw kept going, fall after fall, after fall.  They just kept getting up.  That's what skateboarding is teaching my son, and that's what we all can learn.  

We make mistakes, but we keep going, moment by moment.  Fall a thousand times, get up a thousand times.  Whatever good thing we are doing, even if it is something as simple as getting out of bed, or simply breathing, we don't give up.  

We do one thing at a time and try to finish that task.  And we have to balance the goal with the process.  The goal is important, but if we focus too much on it, we lose touch with the present moment, where the activity is actually happening.  

The young man who won the event, Yuto Horigome from Japan, landed an astonishing first trick and then fell for the next 3 tricks in the competition.  And then he fell again and again during his practice runs.  He said he landed his fifth and final trick and won the gold because he switched his focus from the medal to doing the best trick he could do.  What a great lesson.

When we are more present, focusing on the actual task at hand means we make fewer mistakes and "fall" less often.  

This attention to what is happening right now applies to our work, to our relationships, to all of our daily activities.  It even applies to our inner world--thoughts, emotions, and so on.  

In my view, showing up for our life in its entirety--through all the successes and failures, all the joys and sorrows, the familiar experiences and the unknowns, the hopes and the fears, the richness of it all--this is truly an Olympian feat.

Amazingly, by showing up, by being present, we discover that this very moment is where peace is found.  Not tomorrow, not yesterday.  

Peace is found right now in this moment--whether you are sitting in meditation, walking in your neighborhood or moving fast on a skateboard doing a Nollie 270 to backside bluntslide--the winning trick for the 2024 men's street skateboarding Olympics.

Copyright © 2024 Kurt Scholler / (734) 973-2040 / East Lansing, MI