The Journey.
We have all heard it before. It’s the journey, not the destination. I feel like I have to learn this over and over in my life. Almost every time I arrive or achieve anything I remember, oh yeah, it’s the journey. I think that anything that is good is that. When something is too easy I don’t really stick with it. For me it has to be a balance, it needs to feel like I can do it but still hard enough that I can’t do it right away or every time. I like when things are easy but I do not stick with things that are easy.
“Sometimes it's a little better to travel than to arrive”
― Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values
I recently started learning to ride a motorcycle. When I decided to do this I just wanted to instantly be good at it. But the more I do it the more I realize that riding a motorcycle is on so many levels learning to enjoy the journey. Just the idea of riding one is about the experience of it, not where you go with it. If I am just worried about getting there quickly and safely I will take my car. I do not have dreams to be a professional motorcycle rider, but I do seek to achieve a high level of proficiency. I am seeking that flow state where I am one with the machine and it becomes an extension of me. I love that. I have achieved that with skateboarding or skiing and snowboarding and I can’t wait to do this with a motorcycle. I think that a great comedian or speaker can achieve this with a group of people, where they can get them to merge and laugh together.
As I learn more about motorcycles I see so many parallels with the pursuit of standup comedy. Though many of us fall in the trap of “if we are just doing comedy without aspirations to becoming the best then we’re not really doing it.” The hobbyist is looked down upon in comedy. I, like anyone else, have struggled with this. I do have big aspirations but I also need to remember to love where I am at right now because honestly all I have is right now. The rest is all a fantasy or reflection. Riding a motorcycle is something I must do on my own. I can get instruction and learn how but at the end of the day it’s all and only me. This is apparent in standup comedy as well, I can have friends and teachers help me but in the end it all falls on me. Great comedy is in when the comic is truly in the moment, much like riding a motorcycle. I must be fully present in the moment when I do both of these things. To do these well I can’t be on my phone or anywhere but right here in the moment.
I have seen all my goals as distant things so it's also important to realize when I have arrived. To appreciate what I am doing now, not just always be looking forward miles ahead. Or move on to the next before I have fully appreciated the current place. If I can learn to be present for the journey I can also be present for the destination. I work to always take a step back, when I am wrapped up in what is the next thing, to look around me at what I have and what I am now. Then move presently to the next journey.
I feel a similar fear to stage fright when I approach riding my bike now. It’s a familiar feeling as well as a similar release. I get a huge rush from a standup set, as well as from riding my bike. I love to learn and grow, so I seek out things that facilitate this in my life. It is a feeling of fulfilment to acquire a new skill. This is the beauty of standup for me. I am constantly learning and growing. I think it is so important to periodically take a step back and look at what I am doing now, and what I have accomplished. It’s not the finished piece it’s the ever changing ever growing joke. I love that about comedy, it’s never quite done. Just when I think a joke is finished I will come up with something more or a different tag or angle. It’s in those moments I am reminded that it’s really the process that I love. It’s the process that I need. Comedy is the sriracha I put on everything. It reminds me I am alive, it's essential to me and my life. I’m never going to quit, because I am in love with the process. I am in love with the pursuit of mastery in everything I do.
“It's the sides of the mountain which sustain life, not the top.”
― Robert M. Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values
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Thank you for reading, You’re doing great.
Bjorn RG.