FLYING

Renee (17 year old student pilot) and Matt (instructor)

Twin Cities Aviation

Today, while out on a run, I watched two young girls out on the front steps of their house. They were standing on the top step and jumping onto the landing at the bottom of three, maybe four, steps. Luckily, their father was mowing the lawn or I bet he would have told them to stop. They were having a blast, rolling the landings to soften their falls, getting up, and doing it again.

As I continued on my run, I thought, it is such a natural part of our make-up that we should desire to experience the moment of decision to jump, the flight itself, and the impact of landing. It’s in our bodies to want to do that. It’s in our Soul’s to want to do that. Imagine and remember yourself for a moment, readying to jump, maybe jump off of the spinning merry-go-round, the jungle gym, or a huge rock. What is the experience like of anticipation and then deciding when you go?

The flight. Even if just for a brief moment, you’re flying through the air, feeling the gravitational pull but also the wind on your face. You’re watching the earth, watching your landing. Then, you experience the impact. Yes, indeed, you are still human. You assess any damages, get up, and do it again and again.

Somewhere in the developmental years, we stop flying. We stop jumping. We stop readying ourselves for the unpredictable moment of letting go, jumping off, being in the moment of flight. This natural desire and need goes underground most likely because we skinned our knees, bumped an elbow, or experienced loss of some kind. In this normal human experience of jumping off, we decide to never do that again.

Tolerance for pain, for the unpredictable, or of what someone titled “failure,” disappears. Fear sets in as a familiar guest. In fact, so familiar, we hardly notice that we are responding from a place of protection. We stopped flying long ago and didn’t even notice it.

We stop living the life that our bodies and souls yearn to live. Instead, we stay attached to the safety of the ground, the same job, the same activities, the same neighborhood, even if it doesn’t fit anymore. We unknowingly wait for an event in life to push us off, so unexpectedly that it takes our breath away. This sets in the notion that yes, indeed, life cannot be trusted. See. See what happens?

Our bodies and souls yearn to fly but fear ties them down. They will rebel for a while. You might experience the dis-ease and not know where it came from, override it, get busy with consuming and denial. But you want to fly. You really do. It’s in your nature. Try it. Try it on the front steps first and see what happens.