Peace Love Moto - Where Motorcycling meets Mindfulness
Explore the art of riding with purpose. Hosted by a professional Colorado Rocky Mountain tour guide, Peace Love Moto is your weekly guide to Mindful Motorcycling and finding your Zen on two wheels.
My thanks to the good folks at Go Fast Don’t Die for inspiring this episode. Someday you might be sitting still, watching life through a window, and the only “ride” you get is the distant sound of motorcycles passing by. That’s where we start today, with a vivid porch-side daydream that turns into a simple, urgent question: when the next chance to ride shows up, do you take it?
We talk about why riding a motorcycle feels like time well spent, even when the world insists you should be doing something else. The helmet goes on and the noise in your head finally fades. Deadlines, breaking news, texts, and the endless scroll lose their grip because the road demands your full attention. That focus is more than fun, it’s real stress relief and a form of mindfulness that brings you back to wind, sun, and the physical world. Whether you ride through town or carve mountain passes, motorcycling has a way of turning “too much” into “just this moment.”
Then we get honest about the trap of waiting. Next weekend becomes next month. The bike goes on the charger. Screens fill the time. And all the while, the truth stays the same: the opportunity to ride is not guaranteed. Health can change, finances can shift, and family responsibilities can arrive fast. There will be a last ride for every rider, and none of us knows the date. So if you’ve got the health and the machine, take the ride and make the memory.
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I can easily envision that moment someday down the line. A caregiver at a nursing home where I live approaches me and asks, Mr. Ron, would you like to go outside and sit on the porch? And I look up and I nod quietly. Taking me gently by the hand, they lead me to my rocking chair where I spend most of my remaining time. Sitting there, after a little while, I hear it. The distant rumble of a group of motorcycles passing by. Cherished moments of my younger years. Spent riding solo through the mountain passes or riding to coffee shops with my friends, and in an instant, the feeling of the wind and the sounds of the road returned to me, and I can't help but smile. Well, I'm not that old yet. Maybe getting there sometimes I feel that way. But in this short episode, as we talk through some ideas and we think about our future on the bike, I hope that you'll be able to answer one question. Without a doubt. And the question is, should I go for a ride the next chance that I can? And I hope to convince you today that the answer should always be yes. Let's talk about it. Thank you for joining me today. Stay tuned!
Recorded in beautiful, loveliness, Colorado, welcome to Peace Love Moto, the podcast for motorcyclists seeking that peaceful, easy feeling as we cruise through this life together. Are you ready? Let's go! And today we're talking about time well spent and why waiting for someday to come along might be the biggest mistake anybody can make. You see, some folks say that we're wasting our life out there on the bike day after day, but to you and to me, riding a motorcycle is time well spent because we've come to realize that that someday everybody talks about, that's today. And it is time very well spent when we're having a wonderful time out on our motorcycle.
So you know the exact moment, don't you? I do too. You've got your motorcycle jacket zipped up, you pull on your helmet, and just like that the world becomes quiet. Not from noise necessarily, the audible noise. Yes, the motorcycle's there warming up and other audible things are going on around the bike, but it's the noise, the clutter, and your head. That's what's fading away. And eventually, it's gone. Your cell phone may be ringing, or you may be getting a text, or breaking news may be updating out there on the news media, but you're not sure about that because your phone is packed away somewhere, maybe in a pocket. The to-do list, the constant stress of meetings, deadlines, and the boss who's never satisfied with your work. Not today. That's gone too. That overactive imagination of yours, the fears of failure, the crazy pace of everyday life. Right now, none of that matters. Yeah, it's gonna be a good day, and this is gonna be a good ride. Because for you, every ride is a good ride.
Most days feel like we're juggling 20 things at one time. While at work and when we're not at work. We're just staring at screens, most of us, and we're trying to be entertained or we're trying to learn something or whatever, and meanwhile, the advertisers are trying to sell us something or stress us out on the latest breaking news. We tell ourselves that we'll take a break later. We tell ourselves that we'll go for a ride next weekend, which turns into next month, or whenever life finally settles down. So, oh, it hurts me to even think about this. So you put your bike on the battery charger and call it a season. Then worst of all, you just sit around at home, maybe spending your time just watching TV or scrolling on your phone endlessly. But here's the thing: if you're really a motorcycle rider, if you discovered the passion for it like so many of us have, if you're really fond of finding peace of mind out on the road, and who isn't, I know you found it out there every once in a while. You know that the minute you start up your bike and the tires hit the road, your stress-filled life changes. Because on a motorcycle, that's when the smile hits your face. Remember that old man on the porch? Same smile. Without even thinking about it, on the bike, your brain switches into happy mode. Yeah, that motorcycle demands all of your attention to stay safe. And my friends, that's really a gift. That's a gift because riding a motorcycle clears out that clutter. See, you can't be thinking about the breaking news when you're trying to perfectly hit that apex at the next corner at speed. I've heard that riding a motorcycle even resets your nervous system and it brings you back to the physical world that you were born into. And it doesn't matter if you're in the middle of town or in the middle of the mountains on your motorcycle, the sun and the wind. With those, you're back in touch with your mom, with Mother Nature. And between you and she, you're making memories that may take you all the way to that porch someday.
The opportunity to throw a leg over a motorcycle isn't guaranteed. Life can change in the blink of an eye. A sudden medical diagnosis, a shift in finances, or family responsibilities can sneak up on you out of nowhere. Yes, there will be a time in your life where going off on a motorcycle ride is no longer an option. There will be a day when you and I will take our last ride. And that day, who knows when it's gonna be. But here's the thing: you and I have known folks who spent their entire lives putting off the ride of their dreams. Keep talking about that someday we were talking about earlier, and then life happens and someday just doesn't come. Not anymore, anyway. Taking an afternoon to ride, in my opinion, is not selfish. Some days right now. While out on a ride, when you pull over by a river or you head to your favorite cafe with your friends, you're not wasting the day. You're permanently inserting into your brain a memory that I believe no future hardship can ever take away from you. You may find yourself sitting in an old folks' home, as I was describing earlier, mainly spending your day staring out the window or looking at the walls, just drooling. But I do believe that there will always be a happy memory that you'll come back to again and again. And maybe it's a memory of riding your motorcycle, the thing that you did for so many years, and that brought you such joy.
So let's not let the noise of the world delay experiencing the joy of riding a motorcycle. Don't wait for the perfect weather or that someday to arrive, because it might not. So if you got the health and the machine, take the ride. Grab your gear, start up your motorcycle, and do what you love to do. Just go. Every mile you get to ride is a gift, and it's always time very well spent. Hey, thank you so much for listening today. And if you find value and uplifting podcasts about motorcycling, hey, I hope you hope you find this one is the one. Share it with your friends. Ride safe, take care of the people you love, and be kind to strangers and love your mother nature. Until we visit again. Peace and love to you all. Hope to see you out there.
