By Cathy Hird
Monday morning and I wake up with a sharp pain in my arm just above my wrist. I don't remember bumping it, but I pull up the sleeve to examine the bruise. Nothing shows. A slight touch on the spot hurts though. Somehow I've injured the tendon.

I think back to what I did to hurt the arm. Oh yes. I got out my fly rod for the first time this year. I close my hand as if I had the rod in hand, and sure enough, that is the spot that hurts.

I had tried too hard. Partly trees came too close to the pond. I'd found a gap, but it had taken effort to keep the line straight. I fought the rod to get the line out without catching a twig behind me.

This is a problem, because I have two more days to hang out by this water and relax. If every cast hurts, it isn't going to be much fun.

But relaxing is the point. First time out, I tried to force the line to go where I wanted it. I needed to relax, let the arm flow, let the line find its own way out onto the water.

Over the next couple days, I watch the line. I hold a sense of where I want the fly to land, but I keep my eyes on the curve and flow as the line moves back and out. While I do, I watch the mist on the water. I listen to frogs and birds. My arm relaxes. My body relaxes. The motion of the fly rod gets smooth and graceful. The arc of the line swings and curves. I even catch a decent sized fish.

I have the same problem with downhill skiing. The second time down the hill, I can feel a cramp developing across the arch of my foot. I am trying to force the skis to turn with my feet. Once I get my feet to relax, I can feel the strain in the tendons at the side of my knees. I am trying to pull the skis around the curve. Then, it is my thighs that try to do the work, and after a couple hours they ache.

The next day, my knees are weak and shaky, and my thighs still feel tense. I tell myself that downhill skiing is all about balance and shifting the weight from one ski to the other, but it takes me all season to get the rhythm and feel like I can flow down the slope. If I got there more often, the skill and relaxation would come sooner, but it takes practice.

I am a better skier now that I am learning Tai Chi. That practice is about balance and shifting weight. In the moves, the practitioner pays attention to where each part of their body is and carefully shifts their weight from one side to the other. Foot pushes up and knees receive. Hip relaxes. But it seems to me that the movement starts in the spine. No single joint forces the issue as the whole body moves in harmony and in balance.

With sports or other physical activity, the body helps us learn balance by telling us when we are working too hard. My arm holding the fly rod and my feet in the ski boots tell me that I am not flowing into the movement. In other parts of life, the lesson is harder for me to learn. What tells me that I am pushing too hard? What points out to me that I have not let the natural flow carry me? What helps me to find balance?

When I feel the lines around my eyes, I sense tiredness, and I know I have been pushing. When tears come faster than laughter I learn that I have been pressing for something. When I can't smile at the foibles of people I know and appreciate, I know something is out of balance inside me.

That's when I spend hours by the pond, or head for the ski hill. That's when I take a walk, and sleep late. These twinges tell me that I need to stop forcing the issue and work with the flow of life.

Cathy Hird is a farmer, minister, and writer living near Walters Falls.