I felt it last night, during a mission to tidy up the attic, when I continually climbed and descended four flights of stairs. My legs didn't ache. My breathing wasn't labored. This afternoon, working on a stepladder, I found myself bending and stretching in the oddest of ways (scraping paint off windows -- don't ask) and it felt completely natural, even good.

I'm so grateful that this activity is restoring my flabby muscles, making me move like an athlete again.

Those of you with careers, families, big old houses on the verge of collapse (ahem) probably know this feeling: Here I am on the ice, doing figure after countless figure, and it's all about ME. I'm not answering the phone. I'm not paying bills. I'm not meeting a contractor, waiting for an oil change, standing in line at the grocery store. It's just me -- skating fast and strong, skating just as I've always imagined.

So what has the ice done for YOU?

Mostly, I love the new friends I have made at the rink that understand my love of the sport. I love "talking shop," which is impossible with non-skating friends.

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--
Natalie

http://www.ILoveTaB.com

How has skating changed my life?

Wow, I don't know where to start. There's just so much about skating that has changed me, I'm not even the same person anymore. People from about 5 years back don't even recognize me - I'm not kidding!!

In skating, I am:

• Doing one thing a day that scares me.
• Learning to listen to my body and finding inner peace.
• Being creative.
• Feeling beautiful and like a woman!
• Getting an awesome exciting workout that doesn't feel like one.
• Shedding pounds of flab.
• Wiping away any depression.
• Developing core strength for the first time.
• Simply Floating.
• Letting go of perfectionism and feeling good about it.
• Not letting other people's negativity rain on my parade.
• dealing with setbacks and emotional ups and downs more easily
• managing my time effectively.
• realizing that 5 minutes on the ice can be an eternity.
• Constantly evolving and changing for the better.
• Realizing "impossible" shouldn't be in my vocabulary.
• Learning to pick my battles carefully.
• Learning how to share space.
• Learning how to take one-thing-at-a-time, not 5 simultaneously.
• Learning how to deal with people more effectively.
• Enjoying the learning process, and not suffering from it.
• Having priceless experiences, friends and funnies that money can't buy.
• Having a good laugh about the things I learn and not taking myself too seriously.
• Being more positive in an everyday life and a heck of a lot less negative.
• Focusing on ME time, away from everything, and feeling like a lucky billion dollars about it.
• learning Body, mind and spiritual awareness. It's not just happening in YOGA, folks!

Skating is a healthy addiction, really!

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Keep Evolving. "From this moment forward, every voice that told you - You Can't - , has been silenced." - Freedom Writers

Well...many.

I've made a group of friends that I wouldn't have met otherwise.

I've been pushed out of my comfort level on a regular basis. Wearing tight fitting leggings in public almost killed me the first few times out. Working on a program with people looking on wasn't easy. Trying something that scared the hell out of me and doing it anyway was interesting. And, having a coach invade my personal space was challenging too. I do all the above now without giving it a thought..=-)

I've been reminded of a different part of myself that I seemed to have lost. I am competitive. I do like pushing myself. I love learning new challenges. And, telling me I can't will determine that I will.

Chico

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"I truly believe, when God created skating, he patted himself on the back."

Reduced my bank balance considerably!!!!!!!!!

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AW1
mum to Miss Lil (6yrs old)
mum to be to #2 due in March 08

• Wonderful friends from around the world
• Fitness
• Probably saved my marriage
• Definitely transformed our holidays together

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Mrs Redboots
~~~~~~~~
I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Ice dancers have lovely big curves!

Cecealias, I love your list, it really sums it up and says everything I would have said plus lots that are true for me but I wouldn't have thought to add.

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Karen

I skate - therefore I am

When people ask me what my hobbies are, I have an interesting answer.

I have a way to completely switch off from work - and my boss understands that I WILL NOT work overtime on a Tuesday.

I'm learning to count the beat in music - something I've never tried or needed to do before.

Off-ice, I feel fit for the first time in my life. (On-ice, I'm still exhausted within minutes )

My posture (again, off-ice!) is better than it has ever been.

I have aches, pains and injuries that I've never had to worry about before. Ibuprofen gel and ice packs are my new best friends.

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"Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases:
(1) It's completely impossible.
(2) It's possible, but it's not worth doing.
(3) I said it was a good idea all along."
- Arthur C Clarke

Hm, honestly not all that much... it's another sport (in the list with horseback riding, aerobics, running, triathlons & duathlons, kayaking) that I have come to enjoy and love the challenge of but I'd say that's just about it. Yes, I enjoy it... well most of the time... but it certainly has not been a life altering experience and now, without a coach and the challenge of competition, sometimes even tending towards boring. Maybe it's just a slump I'm in but who knows...

Today it has given me a sprained ankle, 1 year ago it gave me a broken wrist (which is really bad for a professional musician) what else? its made me spend $8000 in 17 months :p, also like above, made me some new life long friends and stuff :-)

But yeah the ankle sucks

Interesting question!

There are the obvious - $$$ spent on skates, coach, and ice time; a whole new circle of friends with a common interest; digging up the backyard for a rink; no free time in my schedule anymore.

But, for me, there are some other very personal things.

I came from a poor background and skated from age 14 to 19 in a backwoodsy rink in the middle of nowhere (no real coaches, no judges, no local competitions). I REALLY wanted to be a good skater but there was virtually no chance to go on to competition from that starting point. I was injured in my last year of skating and gave up on my dream for 36 years. I came back to skating at age 56 (last January) and I know I will never be as good as I was at 18 but I have the resources now to become as good as I can be. So my goal is to find out just how "good" that is. There is also the chance to compete now, not so much to compete against others but to compete against my self and to strive to always be better.

Having that goal has taken me from hardly being able to stand up on skates (January) to the verge of backward edges in just over 3 months. I am in better condition than I have been for years and I have a "drive" that I haven't had for years. If I can get my backward edges and my turns back by early winter, I will start putting together an Interpretive program and consider entering the Canadian Adult Nationals next spring. THAT would be to exceed my childhood dream!

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Dianne
(A.O.S.S.? Got it BAD! )

Skating has given me so much!

I've traveled all over the US to compete on a team, as an individual, at Adult Nationals, and as a delegate for GC.

I have fattened my portfolio with artwork, press releases, newsletters, websites and photos I created in a volunteer position with various clubs. This has demonstrated to potential employers that I am passionate about my chosen profession since I have sharpened my professional skills doing these things voluntarily.

It gave me a hobby that got me off the couch and out of the mall, well, kind of.

As a member of a family with a history of heart disease and parents who were both taking hypertension meds at my age, I'm happy to say I'm rather heart healthy and want to keep it that way.

One of the teens I skate with informed me that while I'm old, I don't act it.

Friends from rink to shining rink!

Those are off the top of my head, but there are more, so many more...

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Champagne in 2005, 2008, 2009 - who's next out of the pre-bronze club...?

Wang chung!

It has given me something to obsess about

It gives me the opportunity to travel all over US and the world.

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Tim David's Website

*Kept me in shape*
*Help me meet new friends*
*Given me something to work for*
*Made me feel better about myself*
*Given me the opportunity to shine*
*Given me a social life outside of school*
*Given me a different sport not many people do*
*Helped me meet many Hockey players*

Basically,
I just love it, and I dont know what I would do without it.
I don't think I can sum it all up into words.

~Best of luck in skating~
Lauren

I absolutelly love skating. It has definitelly given me a lot of new friends which is great as all my non skating friends get bored of me talking about it all the time. It has also given me something that is almost an obsession but in a good way, when I skate I am so focused on it that everything else just goes out of my mind. I love it!

Evelina

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The hardest thing about ice skating is the ice.

"Impossible" is still there, just not where I thought it would be.

Kay

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Visit my figure skating journal
http://www.skatejournal.com/

It has made me lose 40+ pounds and given me legs that are the envy of all my non-skating friends. On the same note, I can wear short--well, mid-thigh length--skirts. And, size 16-18 down to size 10.

It kept me going through my husband's mid-life identity crisis and current separation (much cheaper than therapy)

As above, seriously depletes my checking account--ice time, lessons, and fabric for dresses that I may or may not get around to wearing.

Many new friends, including a lot of the kids at the rink, and their mothers.

Skating has done this for me:

* Provided me with an obsession that, for once, does not revolve around sitting and starting at a screen. Not that there's anything wrong with that!
* Turned out to be a way to express myself physically that takes up where ballet leaves off, for me. Mostly because it's a helluva lot scarier and more challenging. And thereby more rewarding. Any sport in which just existing within it requires skill is a nifty sport, in my eyes.
* Changed my perception about what it means to be a skater and who can do it. Made me realize that I could learn to skate the same way the protege hotshots like Michelle Kwan and Sasha Cohen did--many, many years older and not nearly as well, but but doing it none the less.
* Given me a reason to fear for my life and limb 3 or 4 hours a week.

Edited to say
* Provided me with a hobby which I can tell people about and receive perplexed stares and questions like "You bought roller skates??...Oh, ice skates. We have an ice skating rink here?"

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"Anything worth doing is worth overdoing." (Kathy Butler)

It's an interesting question...being in hideous health 7 years ago and being told by my doctors that sitting on my backside was not an exercise and that if I didn't do something soon I'd be in a wheelchair by the age of 40. Of course there was a conudrum involved, I was still thin, but I was only skin, bone and fat, my achilles tendons were shortening due to atrophy. My health was still poor having suffered through two life threatening episodes.

I moved to a better climate which helped a lot and then it took two years to find my way back to skating. I had been a good swimmer in college, but none of the triathalon based sports worked for me. My family was not thrilled when I picked skating my mother begged me not to do it again. She recalled the concussions all to well, the worst that sent me to the hospital and put into a coma until the swelling subsided. Damn Axel!

In 2000 when I started skating I could only manage a 1/2 an hour a day 3 days a week, I weighed 108 lbs @ 5'9". In 2002 I had a solid axel and weighed about 115 lbs and was competing silver. In 2003 I went and got a bunch of tests done a metabolism of 1700, bone density that was around 100% (I had major risk for osteoprosis) my body fat was really low and I was told to gain more weight. For the last two years I have skated injured, but I only recently got the diagnosis, it's very fixable. What has changed the most is my weight up to 125 lbs w/ a good fat % @ 17 and a resting metabolism of 2300 and bone density of 110+% in all the key spots.

What skating has done for my health is wonderful, people no longer look at me like I am aneroxic, I have small but sturdy muscles that work for me and I will continue to build, for the first time in my life I am happy and healthy.

I have learned to be a good sport, I have learned how to grow and focus on not winning but participating. I have made wonderful friends and learned to enjoy the joy and beauty of something that so few people realize. All my friends know it...it is a wonderful community. It is a wonderful thing to be given a sense of satisfaction and knowing that it is...what it is. I have been allowed to follow a path....I feel very blessed to have found such a lovely group of people and such a wonderful sport.

Don't ask...LOL!

I just wanted to throw in a small 'I agree!' I love skating, but it hasn't been a spiritual experience, just a great winter sport that is a million times more fun than going to the gym.

Where I've noticed the physical changes? Shoulders and posture.

I'll come back later but I lost 5 pounds from skating.. haha

• something to love
• something to hate
• something to love again
• something to waste thousands of dollars on.
• a reason to spend more on "footwear" than I have in my entire life prior.
• a real understanding that more money does not always mean better, and that even expensive skates can be bad for your feet.
• a level of fitness that's higher than I would have ever otherwise accomplished.
• more understanding about the dynamics of a blade and how it's sharpened in relation to an icy surface than anybody sane would ever deem socially acceptable (though the other day at a rink, I heard a girl going on for 10 minutes straight detailing how exactly the zamboni works and why it's better than the competitor brand to her boyfriend who looked about ready to fall asleep - she'd understand!).
• a feeling of pride and happiness about not having a regular job, because it means I have more time to skate.
• the realization that I can do some really "hard" things with ease after a bit of practice.
• the realization that some hard things really are hard, but nothing is impossible.
• a place to escape from everything else.
• peanuts.
• okay okay...a love for peanut butter and banana sandwiches.
• many good and solid nights of sleep.
• a reason to smile.
• a lot of respect for those who are really good at it.
• persistance and perserverence.

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Casey Allen Shobe | http://casey.shobe.info
"What matters is not experience per se but 'effortful study'."
"At first, dreams seem impossible, then improbable, and eventually inevitable" ~ Christopher Reeve

I returned to skating in January aged 32, having previously skated between ages of 12 and 14 (so and 18 year break!)

I find it more physically challenging now than I did the first time round but I'm really glad I finally went back. Like many others here

-I'm losing weight and am toning up
- I've met some great people
- I've had a few bruises (body and ego lol! )
- I'm now learning dance as well as free
- I have fun and LURRRVE it, find it a great way to get rid of stress

Sonic xxx

It has turned me into a skate-a-holic!

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Dianne
(A.O.S.S.? Got it BAD! )