Exactly, a friend invited me and my daughter, Clara to go ice skating, I thought it would be a fun and different experience to do on a slow Sunday. We put our warm clothes (and our courage) on and headed to the rink.
Thanks to previous experiences and to my yoga balancing skills, I did not embarrass myself too much. Clara, on the other hand, had never done it before and the minute she stepped on the ice, she was struggling. The teacher in me started giving her pointers on what had helped me in the past and telling her what she should do. That's when I realized that even before we even put our skates on, all the tips were not only great for the ice but also, for life.
I decided to gather them here in case you're going ice skating for the first time soon or feel like having a couple of life lessons:
1. You will fall.
In the car, I gave her expectations a reality check and prepared her for the multiple tumbles ahead. The truth is she did fall several times but got right back up and got going again. This brings me to lesson number 1: You will tumble in your life, not everything will go smooth sailing or rose petals. There will be times when everything will go wrong in your day, or you'll make the wrong decision or something terrible will happen and you will feel like giving up. But the best thing to do is to pick yourself up, dust yourself off and get going again. There are always opportunities for a do-over. The good times are worth it. Just go for it.
2. Look ahead. If you look down, you will go down.
To be honest my friend Esther said that one and I love it. Clara kept looking at her feet and leaning over kept throwing her body off balance. I love this metaphor because it's full of meaning. There is the literal "up" in life, as in keep reaching towards your goals, dream big, but also, the metaphorical forward, the positive thoughts, and the faith that it will all be well. If you center your attention on the negative, you'll attract the negative in your life. If you complain and focus on what is lacking, you will only feel worse about yourself. So, look up!
3. Take a break.
In the beginning, Clara was falling a lot and in one of the falls, she hit her butt too hard. She started crying and I asked her if she wanted to stop. To my surprise, she said: NO! But she did want to take a break. We often forget how important it is to rest and walk away from it all. It is a wonderful opportunity to give your body time to recover and also to see things from a new, more distant perspective. Rest and breaks are underrated. Hit the reset button. We need them more than we think.
4. Lean Forward and glide your feet.
This one was an important one for Clara because she kept trying to walk on skates. She kept her body stiff and kept lifting her feet off the ice. I told her to lean forward and glide her feet like she does when she's playing around the house sliding with socks on. In life, it is also very important to keep learning and evolving and not to stay stagnant in one spot. Get too comfortable where you are and soon enough will be bored or start to under-appreciate the things you have or what you have achieved. Another important point is to stop trying to do something that worked for a while but doesn't serve you anymore. Sometimes we need to reinvent ourselves or change the way we do things in order to find new meanings and new adventures. Walking doesn't work on the ice, neither does trying to find new outcomes using old ways.
5. Have fun.
And finally, you only live once so you might as well enjoy this one to the fullest. If it's not fun, it's not worth it.
Namaste
