BodyLogos Blog

Tammy in Motorcycle Gear

A Weird and Wonderful NYC Motorcycle Ride

Tammy in Motorcycle GearLong summer treks out of city congestion balance my need for the open road. I’ve lived on a motorcycle in NYC traffic for 25-years.

How unusual to have open road around me when riding through midtown Manhattan. A summer trek right here on Broadway!

CoronaVirus has completely changed the landscape.

It’s an infectious landscape of silence and sirens. Fear-filled vulnerability has seeped into our soft tissues. The streets are near empty. A world is hiding to stay alive.

This feels weird. I’m used to feeling afraid of the world, even hiding from it at times. But, in this moment, there’s no immediate world to be afraid of. It’s surreal. I actually feel safer riding my motorcycle up Broadway than ever before.

As I continue up Central Park West, I hear sirens. Suddenly, I’m whipped back into the landscape I’m familiar with in NYC—traffic. But this time, I embrace the scene. Instead of people being in my way, I felt in their company.

My body feels like it’s riding into a gathering. My body isn’t fearing or dreading its environment. It’s curious about being together with people—having a shared experience.

This feels wonderful. I want to be in relationship with—in communion with—something real.

This is definitely not how I typically approach a NYC traffic jam!
This is definitely not how we feel approaching each other, masked with eyes down, since hit by this pandemic.

But, I have all my motorcycle gear on. No surgical mask necessary when wearing a full-face helmet!

I rode through familiar neighborhoods that day. Visiting a client’s courtyard who passed away from COVID-19, checking on houses of people out of town, and waving to doormen I used to see regularly. But nothing felt the same.

Usually my gear protects me from the world. On this day, it united me with it.
Usually my fear separates me from the world. On this day, it connected me to it.

How weird and wonderful to separate from my habit to fear. And for a moment, be curios about its impermanence, illusiveness and trickery.

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Redefining Strength

I want to change our perception of strength. Strength is the ability to meet resistance and influence an outcome without compromising ourselves. And we already have it.

Strength is not an attribute; it’s a state of being. Gladiators, bodybuilders, and football players demonstrate strength through brute force, sheer willpower, muscle mass, and relentless pursuit. But we’re also quick to identify dancers and martial artists as strong. Their medium taps into a sense of vulnerability, balance, alignment, controlled power, and grace—but no one can deny their strength. Strength may look different on each of us, but it is an inherent part of who we are.

You are not weak by nature; you are stronger than you think. Your strength is not something you need to kill yourself to gain—it is already within you, waiting to be excavated. The key is to stop chasing something you already have and tap into it, so you can manifest that strength in your everyday life.

Because we don’t think we’re strong, we approach resistance with the idea that we’re not enough. We throw everything we have at it and push past our physical, mental, and emotional limitations. We see strength as domination, but it’s not.

When you learn to listen to your body’s divine wisdom, you cultivate a sense of where your body is developing tension instead of standing in its strength. You end the vicious cycle of unrealistic expectations, injury, and self-criticism and learn how to consciously embrace responsible growth. You stop compartmentalizing your strength into emotional, physical, and mental pieces and operate from the strength of your being at all times.

You learn how to align yourself with gravity—instead of working against it—so you can channel your strength to meet life’s resistance. As you meet resistance with equal parts power and alignment, you transform tension into strength

As in the sword dance above, the power lies in bringing just the right amount of force—not too little and not too much. By meeting the sword’s weight, I meet gravity. I am tapped into a larger source of energy, free of tension, and discover a strength that is wholly and uniquely mine.

About Tammy Wise

Tammy Wise is a widely respected mind-body fitness expert based out of New York City, owner of BodyLogos, Inc. author of The Art of Strength: Sculpt the Body ~ Train the Mind. A former Broadway dancer turned Tao minister, Tammy was voted the Best of Fitness by Time Out New York and has appeared in Martha Stewart’s Whole Living magazine, New York Magazine, Natural Health, Shape, and Thrive Global. She’s a Transformational Authors Contest Winner and regular contributor to Honeysuckle magazine and Medium. Visit her at bodylogos.com.

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