Just wanted to share this film with you.

I met Matt a few months ago at the Toronto Bike Show. He’s a class act both on and off bike. Blind or not, the riding is incredible and I felt the inspiration flowing during the film. Hope you and enjoy!! And many thanks to Matt and his crew for sharing this with the world!

With my recent foray in to speaking, particularly with my Trials of Life school presentation, I am often referred to as a motivational speaker. The word motivate in this context has never really felt good to me; let me try to articulate the reasons why.

During the last week or two of December and first few weeks of January, we are hit with advertisements showing fit, sexy women working out, and dudes with eight packs and big smiles. The prime purpose of those images is to motivate you to get in shape as a new years resolution. Many people get off with great gusto, sign up to the gym for a year, and proceed to make an honest effort to get that body they have always dreamt of.

The overindulgence that for some reason is now tied with Christmas certainly helps create the guilt necessary to fuel the fitness club membership. My wife who worked as a fitness instructor at one of these gyms can attest to this failsafe process. Motivation originates most often from outside sources and then is translated in to some kind of personal action. With the right language or sophisticated marketing scheme, it seems we can be motivated to do almost anything, and sometime we don’t even know it (scary). That dream of having a killer bod more often than not ends quite quickly and that incredible motivation you felt is gone, leaving you to feel even more deflated.

I don’t want to be a person who tries to fire people up with fake words of hope and success, especially if it leaves them feeling defeated six months later. My goal when speaking is to spark a feeling from within the students, to inspire them. Ahhh, inspire, now that is a beautiful word! The word ‘inspire’ can be read as ‘in’ + ‘spirit’, so it is a life force that comes from within. It gives you a ‘cup is always full’ attitude, and when inspired the journey is fulfilling in every moment, it’s a process oriented journey, and if things go wrong, no worries, you try something else because you’re not attached to a glorious end result. This action based on inspiration can also be thought of as listening to your heart, and this is the key point I try to express in my speaking.

Recent research in the field of neurocardiology has discovered that the hearts cells are 65% neural, same kind as found in the brain; the heart is essentially a thinking organ, constantly communicating with the brain. This is a complex topic, so I’ll stop there, but the point is that the heart is profoundly more than just a pump.

I’m going to go Yankee on you for a moment in order to make another point. The US Presidential preliminaries are in full force right now, and the November election will be of significant importance globally. It seems that the last US president to write his own speeches was Woodrow Wilson, that was back in 1913-21. For a President to have a chance at being inspirational, it seems to me that he (possibly she) must write his own rhetoric. Both Barek Obama and Hillary Clinton have books to their name, but the latter was written by a ‘ghost’. Sources say that Mr. Obama finds it tough to speak words written for him, that is because he speaks from the heart, he is genuine, and therefore one of the most inspiring potential leaders of our time.

Now it’s not always easy listening to your heart or recognizing true inspiration. Many ideas and opportunities are laced with money, power, and fame; and those promising these results are often just trying to fulfill their own needs, fill their own empty cups that have invisible leaks. I have been romanced by many opportunities that had shiny potential only to be disappointed; and I’ve had many seemingly fantastic ideas dwindle. But sometimes things fall in to place and work out fabulously, so what’s the difference? With experience, you can begin to filter out the true from the false, and the best filter is your heart. Learning to listen to this endless source of wisdom takes time. I have to make a conscious effort to devote time to reflect, with no stress, and to quiet the mind. Going for a solo ride is often a good time for that, just set the intention before you start riding, or put the query you have ‘out there’; then forget about it and try to have a quiet mind (very challenging!) instead of the normal non stop internal dialogue. When I do this, more often than not, the answer will come out of the blue in a moment of, yup…….inspiration. Ryan