It Started With a Wish ...
So today was the day that I decided to do the Dakar in 2009.
When I say "decided", I mean exactly that. I'm not talking about some idle fancy, some "wouldn't it be nice if ..." daydream - I've been through all of that for weeks. I'm talking about actually deciding - actually setting my sights on it and starting to make it happen.
Whenever I have told anybody about my daydream (as it was before today) I have predominatly had a one-word response:
Which is how come it is only today that I have actually decided - I have not really been able to answer that question myself.
The Dakar is all about endurance, and only some of that endurance is physical. It is about taking yourself to your limits, and then realising that you have to push yourself beyond them. It is about setting objectives, and having the commitment to achieve them. It is about discovery, about looking deep inside yourself, about getting to know yourself as a person.
About 2 years ago, I was diagnosed as manic depressive. Basically, that means that I can flip from euphoric to miserable on a daily basis. On the upside, it means that I can experience joy the likes of which normal people never can. The downside is that I can utterly miserable for no reason at all. I kind of think of it as the price I pay for being smart.
It's not the kind of news that you welcome when you're in your mid-30s, trying to bring up a family and hold down a job. Thankfully, I work in IT where temperamental types are sort of tolerated and this has helped me to just blend in with the background.
So, anyway, over the last two years I have been trying to reconcile this and come to terms with it. Sometimes I'm in denial about it, and sometimes I kind of accept it. Today, I'm sort of not believing that I have it.
Imagine that you are expecting visitors to come and stay with you for a while. You dont know when they will arrive, how many of them there will be, or how long they are going to stay. Being bipolar is a lot like that. I am, right now, in the eye of the hurricane and probably will remain there for several years, but I reckon that there's another one in the post.
Some of the most brilliant people in the world are, or were, bipolar:
Into the valley of death,
rode the six hundred ...
which sort of ties in nicely with the whole reason for this blog - the Dakar Rally.
I watched the Long Way Round DVD (Ewan MacGregor and Charley Boorman) and it inspired me. It inspired me so much that when we went on holiday to Malta from the UK, I rode there on my bike (wife and kids flew out). I set out with nothing much more than a vague idea of how to get to Malta, a rucksack and a tank bag. Maybe I'll copy the diary I kept up here on the blog one day.
My missus then made the absolutely fatal mistake of buying me the "Race to Dakar" book. I read it in one sitting - it was absolutely brilliant. Prior to this, I kind of had some vague recollection of Mark Thatcher getting lost in the desert on some mental rally or other - this was the extent of my knowledge about the Dakar. So I immediately bought the DVD - and have almost worn it out watching it.
I used to ride motorcycles many years ago and I got back into it shortly after being diagnosed. There's an awful lot about riding motorcycles that are excellent metaphors for life. My favourite is target fixation or, more simply, 'the bike goes where you look'. It translates into a metaphor for life very well indeed - you will achieve whatever you focus on.
Which brings me to the blog.
I am aiming on completing the Dakar Rally in 2009. I ride approximately 3,000km a month going to work and back but that is on roads. It being some 20 years since I rode a dirt bike, I am effectively doing this from a standing start.
I will be raising money for charity - a mental health charity somehow seems appropriate - I have no idea where to start or how to go about it, and will be trying to enlist the help of people who do.
I will post my progress here. The world may well be interested in it, or may not, but that is the world's concern. Posting here will serve as a day-by-day record of progress so that I can measure it. It is a public sign of my commitment to this project.
Feel free to drop me a line - whether its feedback, questions or if you just want to chat.
If my blog also serves as a source of hope and inspiration to those of us who spend half our time in the pit of despair, then that is a good thing. You are not alone. If it is night for you right now, then day will follow. Hang in there...
When I say "decided", I mean exactly that. I'm not talking about some idle fancy, some "wouldn't it be nice if ..." daydream - I've been through all of that for weeks. I'm talking about actually deciding - actually setting my sights on it and starting to make it happen.
Whenever I have told anybody about my daydream (as it was before today) I have predominatly had a one-word response:
"Why?"
Which is how come it is only today that I have actually decided - I have not really been able to answer that question myself.
The Dakar is all about endurance, and only some of that endurance is physical. It is about taking yourself to your limits, and then realising that you have to push yourself beyond them. It is about setting objectives, and having the commitment to achieve them. It is about discovery, about looking deep inside yourself, about getting to know yourself as a person.
About 2 years ago, I was diagnosed as manic depressive. Basically, that means that I can flip from euphoric to miserable on a daily basis. On the upside, it means that I can experience joy the likes of which normal people never can. The downside is that I can utterly miserable for no reason at all. I kind of think of it as the price I pay for being smart.
It's not the kind of news that you welcome when you're in your mid-30s, trying to bring up a family and hold down a job. Thankfully, I work in IT where temperamental types are sort of tolerated and this has helped me to just blend in with the background.
So, anyway, over the last two years I have been trying to reconcile this and come to terms with it. Sometimes I'm in denial about it, and sometimes I kind of accept it. Today, I'm sort of not believing that I have it.
Imagine that you are expecting visitors to come and stay with you for a while. You dont know when they will arrive, how many of them there will be, or how long they are going to stay. Being bipolar is a lot like that. I am, right now, in the eye of the hurricane and probably will remain there for several years, but I reckon that there's another one in the post.
Some of the most brilliant people in the world are, or were, bipolar:
- Vincent van Gogh
- Napoleon Bonaparte
- Wiston Churchill
- Abraham Lincoln
- Buzz Aldrin
- Spike Milligan
- Stephen Fry
- Alfred Lord Tennyson
Into the valley of death,
rode the six hundred ...
which sort of ties in nicely with the whole reason for this blog - the Dakar Rally.
I watched the Long Way Round DVD (Ewan MacGregor and Charley Boorman) and it inspired me. It inspired me so much that when we went on holiday to Malta from the UK, I rode there on my bike (wife and kids flew out). I set out with nothing much more than a vague idea of how to get to Malta, a rucksack and a tank bag. Maybe I'll copy the diary I kept up here on the blog one day.
My missus then made the absolutely fatal mistake of buying me the "Race to Dakar" book. I read it in one sitting - it was absolutely brilliant. Prior to this, I kind of had some vague recollection of Mark Thatcher getting lost in the desert on some mental rally or other - this was the extent of my knowledge about the Dakar. So I immediately bought the DVD - and have almost worn it out watching it.
I used to ride motorcycles many years ago and I got back into it shortly after being diagnosed. There's an awful lot about riding motorcycles that are excellent metaphors for life. My favourite is target fixation or, more simply, 'the bike goes where you look'. It translates into a metaphor for life very well indeed - you will achieve whatever you focus on.
Which brings me to the blog.
I am aiming on completing the Dakar Rally in 2009. I ride approximately 3,000km a month going to work and back but that is on roads. It being some 20 years since I rode a dirt bike, I am effectively doing this from a standing start.
I will be raising money for charity - a mental health charity somehow seems appropriate - I have no idea where to start or how to go about it, and will be trying to enlist the help of people who do.
I will post my progress here. The world may well be interested in it, or may not, but that is the world's concern. Posting here will serve as a day-by-day record of progress so that I can measure it. It is a public sign of my commitment to this project.
Feel free to drop me a line - whether its feedback, questions or if you just want to chat.
If my blog also serves as a source of hope and inspiration to those of us who spend half our time in the pit of despair, then that is a good thing. You are not alone. If it is night for you right now, then day will follow. Hang in there...
Download the Manic Mission Information Pack for the full story ...
posted by 2009 Dakar at
Monday, May 28, 2007
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