Training Wheels

 

We all cling to outer supports for balance, assurance, protection from falling.  Not unlike the way we used training wheels when first riding a bike.  It seemed impossible to ride without them at first given how we wiggled and wobbled back and forth from the center line.  It was only through faith, lots of practice, and someone’s encouraging hand on the seat pushing us forward that we were able to ride without them finding that improbable single line of balance by the sheer force of the forward motion.

 

The outer things of this world that we put our faith in are like those training wheels.  We cling to them in the hope that they will protect us from harm, loneliness, shame, anxiety, and loss.  We come to believe that our work, relationships, food, entertainment, sex, accolades, money prevents us from falling and enables us to move forward.  It can feel as if without these things, our training wheels, we would be incapable of thriving or surviving. In truth, they inevitable keep us from growing, finding the inner source of our balance, from being free.

 

Life with it's inevitable losses helps us to grow.  The training wheels are always being knocked off or our bike.  Through the many changes in circumstances, the losses, unmet expectations, betrayals, illnesses, and death we will find ourselves time and time again without our safety wheels.  This is our chance to fly.  For it is only in the free fall where we can find the inner source of balance and freedom supporting us and propelling us forward.