On the last day of the Every Woman conference I got to listen to Ashleigh McIvor, the first Olympic gold winner of the women’s ski cross at the recent Winter Olympics.  She’s tall and lithe and she had some surprising things to say.

How often do you think she thought about winning gold?

Would it surprise you to learn rarely.  Yep, she rarely thought about winning gold.

Rather she broke it down.  She focused on winning the next race.  Then the race after that.  Then the race after that.  And so on and so on.

Her focus plus her ability to break down a monumental goal made for success.

Like the picture below, which I took when I was driving back home from the conference, the change between the greenery and the snow covered mountains in the background looks drastic.  In reality it only looks drastic from afar.  Up close the change is incremental, step by step.

Like life.

Have a change that you need to make that seems drastic?  Break it down into incremental step, like Ashleigh McIvor and mother nature.

Bobsledding circa 1910

As the sun sets on the biggest celebration Vancouver’s ever seen my thoughts are returning to the Olympic bobsled competition I watched recently in Whistler.

Run like hell for up to 50 meters, hop in, head down and then, if you’re the guy in back, you’re only role is to brake.  The person whose back you’re nestled into steers.  At up to 118 mph or 180 km/h.

Bobsledding was invented in the late 1800′s when the owner of a resort in San Moritz, Switzerland was trying to find things for his wealthy guests to do. Enter the rejigged delivery sled et voila bobsled. Only problem was the bobsledders were having too much fun sliding down the village alleys and lanes …. and smashing into folks. Enter the dramatic reason to build a dedicated course.

From my icy perch at Whistler I watched the sleds roar around the track – you could hear them come thundering down from some distance away. Occasionally sleds tipped over and still kept swallowing up the track at an alarmingly fast rate.

I wondered what it must be like to be the guy in the back. The guy who puts on the brake. Who says ‘whoa’. Who’s role is to stop the sled, or slow it down. And all of this without being able to see.

How many of us have our heads down and are focused on the brake? As in ‘Nope, can’t do that’. ‘That won’t work’. ‘We tried that before it crashed and burned’.

How many of us give up our role of steering, of having control over the direction of our lives? It’s easier to follow the pack’s course. Less risky. Less chance of failure. Less chance of sticking out like a sore thumb.

I say the stuck out thumb is the one that gets the ride.

How can you stick out your thumb, steer your own course and leave the braking to someone else?

This is the view from the Athlete’s village in the Welcoming Ceremony area …. when you look down.  As a 2010 Vancouver Olympic volunteer I’ve learned a lot about details, alot about looking down.

I thought I was a detail person to start with.  I had nothing on the Olympics.

Names on athlete’s participation certificates are double and even triple checked.  Processes, like distributing mail, have multiple forms to fill in.  Allocating Victory Ceremony tickets for non-accredited participants takes a looooooooooonnnnnnnnggggg time.  I created the form (with multiple columns to check off) to prove it.

Allocating complimentary tickets to sporting events to the National Olympics Committees takes even longer.

As volunteers we have our heads down, focused on details, minutia, routines, schedules, counting medal pouches over and over, adding up numbers, double checking, triple checking until we’re all but cross eyed.

This so the athletes can look up.  Look to gold.  Look to shaving off a few hundredths of a second.  Look to making a difference on the world stage.

What do you look down at?  What’s your view of the details?

This is the view that greets me most mornings as I start my volunteer shift as a NOC assistant for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.

Tim Hortons on the sidelines.  Cups of caffeine left behind, lined up along the garbage can, as we weave our way through security into the athlete’s village.  No liquids allowed.

There’s a million reasons to celebrate… the Olympics, this city, being Canadian.

The Olympics have taken over.  We find ourselves cheering for unfamiliar sports (who invented the skeleton race anyway?).  We burst into singing the Canadian anthem with pride and spontaneity.

Love them or hate them we’re immersed.  Schedules run amok.  Routines are out the window.  Familiar traffic routes are no more.

I have to concentrate to figure out what day it is and what time of day it is.  The other day I jumped out of bed at 5:37 am shouting expletives because I thought I’d overslept and missed my 5:35 bus which would take my sleepy butt to my next volunteer shift.

That is until a sleepy husband reminded me I was on the night shift.

When were you last immersed in something, when up became down and right became left?  And thinking of those lonely Tim Horton cups, what did you have to leave behind in order to move forward?

Rock.Paper.Scissors playing RCMP roving characters at the North Van Olympic torch relay, pictured here with Premier Gordon Campbell.

I was lucky enough to take part in the dress rehearsal of the 21st Vancouver Winter Olympic Opening Ceremonies.

The same ceremonies that will be viewed by some 3 billion (with a b) eyeballs later today.

I spent most of the time with tears coursing down my face.  If you were there and if you inhaled deeply enough you would have been able to smell the slight tinge of saline mixed with an older, slightly musty smell… the smell of Canadian pride being brought out, dusted off and worn for all to see.

Shivers danced up and down my spine like aerial acrobats.  My mouth gaped like a kid on Christmas day, getting the present ever.  Ever.

I was caught off guard by the emotion, the deep swelling of pride in this nation.

The same nation we’re slow to praise and quick to make fun of.

We’re not noisy about our love affair with our country like our neighbours to the south.  In fact we often get drowned out by them.  But the pride is there nonetheless.

For the first time First Nations were an integral part of the ceremony.  Colours were a blur as nations from the east, west, north and central came and danced and welcomed the world.

The biggest roar was saved for the Canadian athletes as the rounded the bend.  For a moment we were united in celebrating their feats to come.

Massive three-tiered banners of fabric hung from the ceiling alternately became the ocean, trees and totem poles as light was shone on and through them.  Through some sleight of hand it transformed us, the audience.  Gasps were audible.  Hands became sore from clapping and throats hoarse from yelling.

The opening scenes were pure BC beauty.  Remote snow capped mountain, rugged and regal.  And then a lone snowboarder.  On top of the world.  With a kick he set off, all swirling snow and powder puffs.  All eyes were on him as he skimmed effortlessly down crazy steep slopes.  Then for a second he disappeared…

… until he burst onto the stage for real, sliding down a huge ramp and with a graceful flip ended up in the middle of the stadium.  A sweet taste of what was to come.  Magic.  Being swept away.

A spoken word artist worked his magic by describing this, our indescribably country and that maybe being Canadian was a simple as saying ‘please’ and ‘thank-you’.  And yes, our Z rhymes with Ted dammit.

When KD Lang took to a massive central podium, dressed simply in white and captivated everyone with her version of  Hallelujah, she reached deep into everyone’s heart and for a moment, removed the cynic.  With breath caught and eyes kindled by with hope, you were caught up in a net cast wide with possibilities.

Audience members were given lights and we played our part as we lit them in sync, until wave after wave, the stadium was alive with light.  Other times our lights were the constellations and yet others thunderbolts.

Confession time: for the dress rehearsal we didn’t actually get given the lights but rather pretended to wave them about.  Ever resourceful though, folks brought out cell phones and the glowing screens were almost as good.  Better in some ways as we all yearned to be part of the magic.

With my IPhone flashlight app I got to be a part of the ceremonies.  Not passively sitting there, being a quiet receptacle.  But rather, as the social media world has showed us, at the centre, involved, loudly and proudly.

Maybe we can do it.  Maybe we can dig ourselves out from under the weight of poverty, war, racism, terrorism and other soul-crushing issues.  Maybe there is a god above.

Let the games begin.

(We were asked not to share anything about the ceremonies until the real thing; hence the blackout the first time this post was published this morning.  This version is the full version, now that the games are officially underway.  I was filled with awe to be part of the rehearsal and have been slightly giddy with keeping the secret.)

Myles Horton was a famous adult educator in the Appalachian mountains.  He rode the rails with the hobos and learned valuable lessons from them, lessons that I’m applying during my volunteer work at the 2010 Olympics.

Fire was valuable to the vulnerable men who hitched a ride by train.  Fire kept you warm.  It protected you.  It was a means to a meal.

During those long train rides Myles learned that if you used up your fuel source too soon the fire would go out, leaving you cold and vulnerable throughout the night.

He also recalled times when men kept the fire burning too low and there wouldn’t be enough heat.  You’d still go cold and hungry.

In his autobiography ‘The Long Haul’ he talks about how our life’s drive and goals are the same.

Fire yourself up too much, burn the midnight oil too often, don’t take care of your whole self, don’t have a life beyond work and you’re in trouble.  All consuming and consumed, you’re headed off the rails and towards burnout and major stress.

Don’t fire yourself up enough and you’ve got no heat, no oomph, no zing, passion, or drive.  You’re coasting through life, unengaged and uninspired.

The trick?  Keeping your fire burning at a level that works for you.

Speaking of which, I’m volunteering for the 2010 Olympic Games.  We volunteer 6 days on, have 1 off and work 9 hour days.  Fire’s on my mind, I’m tending the flame.

And you?  How’s your fire?