top of page

freaking amazing humans

Updated: Jan 23, 2020


Bodies are freaking amazing.

Yet being so “in tune” is a blessing and a curse. For example, my left calf and hamstring felt crazy tight the other day, and I immediately put on my Curious Hat. Perhaps I need to practice less body awareness and get out of my body into a state of mindlessness. Forget the mind-body connection: This lady needs the anti-prescription approach.

Bodies are freaking amazing.

Yoga continues to heal me, I’m 100% convinced. There’s nothing like doing yoga in your shoebox apartment as your husband eats a roasted chicken from Gristedes at the kitchen table about 20 feet away from you. This morning he stumbled out of bed 40 minutes earlier than usual, because he chose this morning – the first morning I decided to get up earlier and do a full hour yoga session in our living room – to shake up his 7:30am like-clockwork rising time. There’s nothing like a hearty slap on the ass and a “Nice!” as you try to focus on your breathing and alignment and mindful presence in Downward Facing Dog. Nope, that’s just too good and bad all at the same time.

Bodies are freaking amazing.

We spent about an hour and a half watching the NYC marathon from the same spot as last year – 90th and 5th, just where the course bends into the park for mile 24.

I finally fell into the spirit of the day, which Dennis called the best day of the year for our city. We left just after this poignant succession of highlights:

  1. Strength: A double-amputee booking it with his amazing false “sneaker feet”. What science can do now absolutely astounds me, not to mention the human spirit. His shirt said something like “Always challenged, never beaten”, or some saying that cannot help but swell a New York-semi-salted heart.

  2. Connection: A guide running with his runner, a round string between them, linking them in pace, stride, and probably breathing rate, for 26.2 miles through the city.

  3. WTF: And, finally, a man I can only describe as otherworldly. A shirtless living Ken doll, complete with short, blonde, flowing locks, who ran like a gazelle through the crowd. He was beyond attractive, but I literally couldn’t peel my eyes away as he ran past me. Yes, me. It was just me and him in that moment. Everything else was ether. He appeared so perfect a specimen that my staring was less awe and more confusion as to where he came from – as in, what planet. So, yes, I swiveled my heart a complete 180-degrees with mouth agape. And I was caught by Dennis, who snapped me back to reality by shouting, “Hello?! I’m right here!”...right before we both exploded in laughter.

Bodies are freaking amazing.

 

In the end, I suppose this post is really about relationship: Relationship with yourself, relationship with your partner in crime, relationship with the spirit of the human race.

Because, at the end of the day, you have to admit that humans are pretty freaking amazing. We are at once beautiful...and a complete shit show. We are at once a perfect, self-regulating bio-mechanical machine...and utterly lost and clueless 99% of the time. We send men to the moon...and yet spend, when you add it all up, approximately 40 minutes of every year of our lives struggling to peel stickers off of pieces of fruit.

Unlike any other member of the animal kingdom, we are both primal creatures and super-beings. We really, when it comes right down to it, have simultaneously 1) the world at our fingertips, and 2) absolutely no rhyme and reason to our decisions.

We are, at gut-level, all instinct. We are, at head level, geniuses. And we are, at heart level -- you know, with some exceptions -- gushy piles of mush who cry at cotton commercials, even if we would never admit it.

We are freaking amazing.

And I, for one, feel darn proud to be a part of the greater Us.

Cheers to Us, my friends.

Comments


© 2017 jewolff.com

New York

  • LinkedIn
bottom of page