Saturday, August 25, 2012

Skating Your Way to Bliss

Hello, friends! 

This week has been an incredibly exciting week for me.  As many of you know, I sent out my first email newsletter announcing the opening of my online jewelry shop.  



The newsletter took me far longer than I thought possible, requiring me to learn a bit of HTML in the process (which was much more than I really wanted to know!).  But I know it's all personal growth!  It has been my dream for more than 5 years to have my jewelry available online.  So, having that dream come to fruition in a big way has made me feel like I am exactly where I should be.  An amazing feeling!

How does this relate to skating, you may ask.  Well, it made me think about self care and what we each do that helps us feel happy, grounded, and at peace during what can be stressful times (for even positive change can be stressful).  For me, an essential component of keeping myself mentally on track is to go skating.  So, even though I did not find time to blog about skating this week, rest assured that I made sure I found the time to skate.  

This last week, I skated 6 out of 7 days (rested today and instead had lunch at Corners Tavern in Walnut Creek with husband Marty and, by chance, friends Marie and Ken--just what I needed to have fun and relax).  But I know I'm truly addicted to skating when there are days I actually contemplate going a second time in the same day!  I know, some of you think I'm mental.

Here's what I get out of skating:

1. Endorphins:  I think the more you exercise, the better you are at finding that zone where you are optimizing the endorphin production in your brain...the best natural drug around!

2. Calm: I feel so much more resilient to handle problems if I'm skating regularly.

3. Joy: I smile almost the entire time, even when working my tail off skating uphill into a headwind.  It is one of the happiest time of my day (haha...okay, I know, the endorphins, but it's more than that).  On the downhills, I literally am dancing down the hill.  Such childlike exuberance!

4. Energy: the more I exercise, the better my body feels.

5. Insight: I've started writing ideas down in the "Notes" app on my iPhone as I skate, because the most amazing flashes just leap unbidden into my consciousness as I roll along the trail.  For instance, I often think of jewelry pieces I want to create, ideas for my jewelry newsletter, even the idea to create this blog came to me while skating...so many, many bits of inspiration.  

Recently, while I was skating, I had the thought that I'd like to show a jewelry piece from beginning to end and document it in my newsletter week by week (see the first photo below, which was in my first e-newsletter).  I just try to listen and honor the messages my deep wise mind sends my way, even if I don't immediately know what the message means.

Some beads on my bench that are calling out for me to create a new piece.
I think they will become a necklace, but don't hold me to it!

I know these are not new ideas to those of you that would consider themselves athletes.  My friend Tricia, for instance, has transformed her life as she's gotten into running over the last couple of years--it is so inspiring.  I consider her an athlete.  As for me, until about 7 months ago I would never have considered thought that way about myself.  Sure, at times I've been regular at exercise, but something has now changed in my brain and I no longer consider exercise optional, particularly joyous exercise.  Feels pretty darn good, I have to say.

I hope that you also have something in your life you enjoy and depend on like I do skating, especially as you go through tumultuous times.  If you have something like that, bravo and keep it up!  If you feel like that part of your life is is somehow missing in action, give something new a try!  If you think inline skating might be that thing for you, leave me a message here and maybe we meet up on the trail. 

Keep skating! 
Nancie ♥ 

Click here to read my newsletter


P.S. I think in my next blog, I'll have to explain who NamiZuni is and why my jewelry business has that name!



8/24/12 
Skate #113
Lafayette-Moraga Trail 2.8 mi


Saturday, August 18, 2012

5 Ways to Shake up Your Routine

Hello, friends! 

My son's driving instructor advised him to take a different route every time he drives to prevent Alzheimer's; now that my son has his license, he seeks out different directions and unfamiliar streets.  I don't know about his instructor's claim that it will prevent dementia in later years, but I strongly agree in the need to stimulate our brains.  As we age,  most of us have the tendency to settle in to familiar, safe routines, to fossilize a bit.  


Here are 5 ways that I try to shake up my routine:

1. Try a different route

Like my son's driving instructor, I try to explore different trails, different terrain.  Sometimes it can be as simple as parking at the opposite end of my trail and doing it in the opposite direction.  Sometimes it can be going off the trail and onto the street.  

2. Change your equipment

Recently, my sister gave me a pair of skates that no longer fit her.  I had been used to my 10-year-old pair that I call "Old Faithful."  These new skates were a different brand, different style, different sized wheels.  The first time I used them, it felt so awkward.  Now they don't, but they still feel different.  I have to use slightly different muscles.  My balance has to be adjusted.  I have to brake differently.  They stretch my abilities.  I love that about them.

3. Learn a new technique

I've used the same technique for years when going over bumps and curbs.  I try to relax and usually step from one skate to the other, in effect, stepping over the obstacle.  A few weeks ago I wondered if I could instead lift my body up out of my skates, in other words, "jump" over the obstacle.  Lest you think I'm trying some Evel Knievel or Tony Hawk maneuvers, let me assure you that I am not!  My wheels may not even leave the pavement, but I skate easily over the obstacles because my weight is not pressing down on the wheels.  I'm continuing to practice and practice this.  Who knows, maybe at some point you will see me clearing hurdles!

4. Push yourself a bit farther than you thought was your limit

Skate further, skate faster, skate on a day when you think you may not feel like it.  All of it helps train your brain that you are not locked into your preconceived limitations.

5. Look at obstacles as opportunities

Look obstacles not as messages that you cannot or should not do something, but instead as an indication that you need to change something: ice that sore knee, try changing your equipment, try a different technique, persevere through a challenge.  As my business coach Joan Silva says (Your Money Dream), the biggest frustration comes right before a fantastic breakthrough.  

All of this is to say that the more you apply these techniques to one aspect in your life (in my case, skating), the more you can implement growth into other parts of your life.  As I get better at skating and better at shaking up my skating routine, the more I feel comfortable stretching myself into all my endeavors--my jewelry business, my relationships, other goals and challenges.

Try picking one of these techniques in your day-to-day life...even if it's just taking a different route driving to the store!

Here's my goal while skating:  in 10 years, I want people to see me zooming by them on the hills and comment, "Wow, that old broad is still skating!"


Keep skating! 
Nancie ♥ 



 P.S. Here's the jewelry I was wearing while skating:



These earrings are super light, recycled paper beads that women in Uganda make.  The sale of their beads help these women and their families succeed.  In addition, I donate 10% of the purchase price to Kiva and other organizations that help women around the world lift themselves out of poverty.

Click here to visit my "Beads for Hope" section of my on-line shop

Click here to visit Kiva.org



8/17/12 
Skate #106
Lafayette-Moraga Trail 5.0 mi

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Rumble Strips...Conquered!

Hello, friends!

You know those little yellow bumpy strips they have at intersections?  They look like Lego dots with more rounded tops.  I call them rumble strips, but they are formally called "detectable warning surfaces."  Usually yellow, but occasionally red in some areas, they are designed to meet Federal Americans with Disabilities Act standards. The bright color combined with the raised bumps allows walkers and bicyclists of all abilities to have a better idea of where the sidewalk transitions to a road.  They apparently are also designed to thwart easy crossing of streets by skaters!

Here is a picture of the new, extra bumpy strips that were recently installed on my favorite trail:


I don't know if you can tell from this picture, but the strips are installed nicely parallel with the road, but not necessarily with the path.  That means when I skate across them, I get a very bumpy, very insecure ride.  Not what I'm going for when I'm also negotiating traffic and a bumpier surface on the roadway.

For weeks, I've been slowing down almost to a stop and then gingerly pick my way across the strip.  My other option is to try to skate around, but as you can see, there's not much room.  

This week I decided I needed a new approach, an opportunity for growth, if you will (trying to look for growth instead of annoyance).  First, I paid attention to how I could hold my body differently: if I stopped fighting the dots and let myself feel light in my skates, the vibration was less.  Then I tried having a bit more speed: the skates floated across more easily.  Finally, my aha moment brought it all together: if I skated parallel with the dots (which required me to skate not straight across the street but at an angle), my skates naturally found the grooves between the dots.  Voila!  

That's one thing I love about skating--always something new to learn that also teaches me lessons about other parts of my life.  If I go with the flow, relax, stay centered, be willing to try a new approach, and not be so afraid of "what if," I more easily glide over the obstacles in my path.

Next blog: how installing my new wheels and brakes allowed me to turn 3 fairly serviceable pairs of skates into zero pairs of skates.  

Keep skating!
Nancie  


P.S. If you want to see the jewelry I was wearing while skating, here it is.  (Yes, I even wear nice pieces when I get hot and sweaty!  I like pretty things and peridot is August's birthstone.)






Peridot and Sterling Silver Necklace






8/15/12
Skate #105
Lafayette-Moraga Trail
5.2 mi

Monday, August 13, 2012

Head in the Clouds

Hello, friends!

What does the universe do when you have your head too far in the clouds?  Why, bring you back down to earth just a little bit!

After a day off from skating yesterday, I happily hit the Lafayette-Moraga Trail early this morning.  My mood was sunny, dreamy, a bit romantic.  Here's the song by Naturally 7 that I was listening to, which fit my mood perfectly:

Gone with the Wind by Naturally 7:

Gone With the Wind
(#LoveLustandLonging, song #3)

(Tie in to Song #2, Sway by Michael Buble: Naturally 7 opened for Michael Buble during his 2010 tour.  Naturally 7 makes every sound with just their mouths and hands...not a gimmick, just good music, but impressive when you stop and think that the music is totally a cappella.)

After strapping on my gear (no socks, you'd think my last blog about preparation would have had a better effect on me), I stepped carefully through the new extra-thick layer of gravel that was just added to the parking area, and I stepped onto the trail, thinking how gracefully I had negotiated the walk through the gravel.

Without realizing what happened, I found myself sitting on the pavement.  I wasn't hurt, just surprised to find myself at ground level.  I'm not sure even how I fell.  I dusted off my pride and stood up again.  Whoom, back on the pavement.  A little chuckle at myself, another pride dusting, and I hoisted myself back to standing again.  

A bit of dreaminess is a wonderful thing (and I do enjoy my dreamy side), but skating reminds me to also stay centered and solidly in my body as well.  It's all about balance.

Keep skating!
Nancie  

Shameless plug, here are the earrings I was wearing while skating...no socks, mind you, but I did remember to look good!

Turquoise teardrops and sterling silver














8/13/12
Skate #103
Lafayette-Moraga Trail
4.5 mi

Saturday, August 11, 2012

Preparation


Hello, friends!

This morning I was reminded of how important preparation is in any undertaking, but specifically skating. Every time I skate I always put my gear on in the same order (and try to leave it all in the car) so that I don't forget anything (I've forgotten my helmet in months past, which chagrins me in retrospect, as my helmet is one of my most important pieces of equipment--it protects the part of me that I'd most like to keep!).  This morning as I was leaving the house, I was thinking that I never like to leave the house without some jewelry, at least earrings--I am a jewelry designer, after all, here are the earrings I was wearing:





New Zealand abalone:

(I was even thinking to myself..."Wow, I even have some of my favorite earrings on...I am SO prepared!")



https://www.etsy.com/listing/104121086/paua-shell-new-zealand-abalone-and


Here's my normal pre-skate routine:

Eat a Fage cherry yogurt before leaving house...check
Drive to skating trail...check
Headphones...check
Helmet...check
Socks...check (well, I've forgotten these more times than I'd like!)
Skates...check
Wrist guards...check
Lock car...check

Then I select a playlist on my iPhone, start my Nike + runner app and hit the trail.  Yee-haa!  

This morning I was driving to my starting point and I went, "Duh!  My skates are still at home!"  I had brought them inside last night to put in new gel insoles.  I was so excited to get out there and exercise before it got hot (and even feeling so smug that I was stylishly decked out in pretty earrings), that I was just on auto-pilot.  Now, I've skated without one or two of the items in my preparation list above.  I think the skates, however, are the one piece of equipment I would be hard pressed to do without!

I'm a firm believer that the universe provides you obstacles to test how much you want something, and I really wanted to skate, so I turned around and drove home, grabbed my skates, and finally hit the trail a bit later than expected.  It was all good.  Great skate, cocoa cappuccino (with chocolate drizzle on top depicting the men's platform diving finals...thanks, barrista Jennifer, lol!), and then home to shower.

If you want to see what I have to say in this skating blog from time to time, I created a Facebook page called "NamiZuni Skates."  You can click on the following link, click the "Like" button, and then you'll get minimal posting from this blog that you can either read if you want or ignore if you have your own life!

                    New Facebook page:                        http://www.facebook.com/namizuniskates



By the way, my friend Adolfo (who is a real gem...so smart and so supportive!) pointed me towards the author Jonah Lehrer, who has some fascinating insights into the creative process (after I wrote how I often get creative jewlery ideas and other insights while I skate).  According to Lehrer, sometimes we need a break from a project to clear our heads (such as a walk or a skate) and sometimes we need to buckle down and use our perseverance to power through a problem.  As it turns out, according to his research into the subject, if we listen, our brains instinctively know which choice will lead to the best outcome for a particular problem.

Here is a link to his talk on NPR:

Jonah Lehrer



Tomorrow: yoga class with my sweet husband.


Keep skating!
Nancie  


Skate #102

Lafayette-Moraga Trail
78 degrees

Friday, August 10, 2012

Yee-haaaaa!

Hello, friends!

Today I got out early because it promises to be another hot one (okay, I know "it's a dry heat" but 102 is still hot, even without east-coast humidity!).  I went locally on the Lafayette-Moraga Trail near St. Mary's College (one of my favorite hilly skates).  I park near the petanque courts (can someone please explain the difference between petanque and bocci ball?) and skate to the Commons and back (a little over 4 miles).  The beauty of it is that I do all the steepest uphills on my way out and am rewarded by some awesome speedy downhill sections on the way back to my car.  

Many years ago the leader of my mom's hiking club in Tahoe was telling her that everyone should have an expression that works like a sort of rally for action, a battle cry if you will.  When you are having an especially exciting time or if you are trying to psych yourself up to do something hard, you invoke this expression, spurring you to do your best and to have fun while doing it.  You know, something like "hoo-rah" or "woo-hoo!" or "I'm the king of the world!"

I decided my rally cry would be "Yee-ha!"  Whenever I skate down the steepest part of the hill (which happens to bank at a weird angle and has an especially bumpy section right at the bottom), I put my arms up in the air and shout out "Yeeeeee-haaaaaaa!"  I'm sure the pedestrians think I'm a bit crazy, but the bikers seem to get it;  I think they understand the thrill and excitement of speeding just a bit out of control.

What's your rally cry?

Keep skating!
Nancie  


Skate #101
Temp. 73 degrees

Thursday, August 9, 2012

My 100th Skate of 2012!

Hello, friends!

I've been skating on in-line skates for the last 10 years off and on, but I hadn't been skating regularly over the last 5 years or so since my dear friend Cynthia moved away from the Bay Area.

In the beginning of 2012, something clicked for me exercise-wise and before too long I found myself strapping on my Rollerblades and hitting one of the nearby trails on a regular basis (usually either the Iron Horse Trail in Walnut Creek/Alamo or the Lafayette-Moraga Trail near St. Mary's).  By February I was out skating about 3 times/week.   Now I find myself putting on the skates 5 or 6 times a week.  (I could tell today that I am completely addicted when I found myself contemplating going for a second skate today--the 102 degree temperature put me off that idea!).


                              One of my favorite spots (the Lafayette-Moraga Trail)

Last week I started using a cool iPhone app from Nike (thanks, Devon!) to track my progress skating.  (It thinks I'm running rather than skating, but I like the interface and it does what I want it to do, which is to track each workout's stats--speed, distance, comparisons to previous workouts.)  Using the Nike app to track my workouts made me stop and calculate about how many times I've skated since the beginning of 2012.  I realized that today would be about my 100th skate (okay I may be off by one or two, but for my purposes, let say today was number 100!).  Most of my skates are 4 to 5 miles long, so that means I've skated more than 400 miles in 2012.

Skating for me is like a moving meditation.  Somehow when I skate, ideas just pop into my conscious  mind from somewhere deep in my soul.  I get ideas for my jewelry business--NamiZuni Jewelry Design (namizunijewelry.etsy.com), insights into problems I've been wrestling with, and lessons from skating that apply to my life in general.

In a nutshell, NamiZuni is my inner goddess.  When I skate, she speaks to me.  More later about how "NamiZuni" got her name...

What can you do to honor your bliss?

Keep skating!
Nancie