Does riding a bike make you a bit different from people who use other transportation methods? Some would argue that it doesn’t, but we think otherwise. Why is that? It is because riding is different from driving or flying a plane. You need to be a part of the bike in order to advance. As the great John Howard used to say “The bicycle is a curious vehicle. Its passenger is its engine”.
It is not as demanding as snowboarding, or some other sport, and you can do it everyday for the rest of your life. People in Copenhagen, where the weather is cold, ride even when it is snowing. The upside would be the fact that you can stress your body when riding, and you can let your mind wonder freely at the same time. One example is Albert Einstein who famously wrote that he had thought of ideas and principles used in the book while riding his bicycle.
This is a point that Elizabeth West was sure to make when saying that “When man invented the bicycle he reached the peak of his attainments. Here was a machine of precision and balance for the convenience of man. And (unlike subsequent inventions for man’s convenience) the more he used it, the fitter his body became. Here, for once, was a product of man’s brain that was entirely beneficial to those who used it, and of no harm or irritation to others. Progress should have stopped when man invented the bicycle. “
But the sometimes stressed feeling you and I feel after a bad day at work has to clear out some time. You can either sleep or you can go and exercise a bit to get that weight off your shoulders. This was not a secret for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.
“When the spirits are low, when the day appears dark, when work becomes monotonous, when hope hardly seems worth having, just mount a bicycle and go out for a spin down the road, without thought on anything but the ride you are taking.” ~ Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Here are a few more inspirational quotes that refer to life as a bike ride:
- It never gets easier, you just go faster. ~ Greg LeMond.
- The journey of life is like a man riding a bicycle. We know he got on the bicycle and started to move. We know that at some point he will stop and get off. We know that if he stops moving and does not get off he will fall off. ~ William G. Golding English
- Whenever I see an adult on a bicycle, I have hope for the human race. ~ H.G. Wells
- Let a man find himself, in distinction from others, on top of two wheels with a chain — at least in a poor country like Russia — and his vanity begins to swell out like his tires. ~ Leon Trotsky
- Get a bicycle. You will certainly not regret it, if you live. ~ Mark Twain Taming the Bicycle. 1884
- Melancholy is incompatible with bicycling. ~ James E. Starrs
- The bicycle is just as good company as most husbands and, when it gets old and shabby, a woman can dispose of it and get a new one without shocking the entire community. ~ Ann Strong
- You never have the wind with you — either it is against you or you’re having a good day. ~ Daniel Behrman
- Think of bicycles as rideable art that can just about save the world. ~ Grant Petersen
- The bicycle is the noblest invention of mankind. ~ William Saroyan Nobel prize winner
- The bicycle, the bicycle, surely should always be the vehicle of novelists and poets.~ Christopher Morely Nobel prize winner
- Bicycles are the indicator species of a community, like shellfish in a bay.~ P. Martin Scott
- Whoever invented the bicycle deserves the thanks of humanity. ~ Lord Charles Beresford
- Life is like a ten speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use. ~ Charles M. Schulz
