Why Riding Your Bicycle Is So Good for You

As beautiful as autumn in California is, for me the season is also bittersweet. The red and gold leaves and brisk air whisper to me gently, reminding me that for the next five months, I will be car commuting rather than bike riding to work. I have to drive from now until the sun remains high enough in the sky again to light my path home.

On my bike, I feel as free as a child.

As I fly down the hill where we live, the cool San Francisco Bay winds jostle my cheeks. I dodge a handful of clucking wild turkeys, turn a hard left at a schoolyard filled with delighted shrieks, and hum past the fragrant jasmine bush that nearly pokes me in the face each time. Then I pause, finally, at a traffic light, where the other day I shared a smile with a young woman walking her yapping white terrier.

After about 45 minutes, in a delicious whoosh, I pull up in front of my office building and lock up my bike. I feel accomplished, proud, and calm. If ever I'm ready to start my day as a therapist listening to people's weary troubles, it's then.

I'm not a diehard cyclist. I’m just a woman commuting 12 miles a day from her home to her office a couple of times a week on an e-bike. (An e-bike works best for me because I can't arrive at my office too sweaty. It also shaves considerable time off the commute, which means I am less likely to grab my car keys on a morning when I’m in a crunch).

Besides the personal feeling of freedom I get from biking to work, this high is infectious. I pass by other bike riders on the pathway and notice their bright eyes, the soft smiles curving their lips. I can practically feel a shared field of emanating gratitude—or just deep satisfaction—and I enjoy this feeling of connection with others.

When my husband and I first got our electric bicycle during the pandemic, I was excited but slightly petrified. The cargo model with the rear seat was an elongated hunk of orange metal twice the length of a normal bicycle that weighed upwards of 80 pounds. It felt foreign and motorcycle-like. When I soared up hills on "turbo" speed that I'd normally be forced to walk my bike up, I mouthed an audible "Woooow." I'd done my fair share of biking over the years, but… tote two kids on the back of this thing? Forget it.

Meanwhile, my husband did just that, whizzing our two daughters to and from school and after-school activities. I avoided the big bike in the shed for another couple of years.

Until one day — with the disturbing scent of wildfire smoke infusing the air — I drove to work in our gas-powered car, as usual. At a traffic light, I considered the inanity of my actions. Here I was, engine idling, spewing invisible CO2 out of my tailpipe, contributing to the very problem of climate change and wildfires even as that menace reared its head all around me. And even as I went to my counseling job where I talk to people about climate anxiety and brainstorm ways to redirect their emotions into action. What on earth was I doing?

"I'm ready for a lesson on the e-bike," I announced at dinner that night. After dinner and a 15-minute tutorial outside — my two young daughters cheering me on from the sidewalk — I biked some shaky warm-up circles. We must start somewhere.

After a week of practicing short-distance rides, I had my first successful ride to work. My heart flapped inside of my chest like a happy butterfly. I was pure smiles, even with some understandable nerves.

Finally! a voice inside me shrieked on my ride home that night. For so long, I had been mired in the dissonance of driving and polluting while caring deeply about the effects of climate change and feeling guilty about my part. By biking to work with good old human-powered energy (fueled by renewable energy since our home is solar-powered), I felt a palpable sense of relief, proud to join a community of bikers, and to align with my values.

This state is called cognitive consonance — when your external behavior aligns with your internal thoughts, feelings, values and beliefs.

Twice a week now, from April to October, when I arrive home after my workday and 45-minute bike ride, I'm a ruddy-faced, happy bundle. My husband laughs, saying, "I love when it's your ride-to-work day! You always have a glow and seem so happy."

Our whole family feels the positive effects of this one choice, the benefits extending well beyond non-pollution. My bike commute offers me heart-pumping exercise, fresh air time, stress reduction, free transportation, connection to other humans, community connection.

And, perhaps most significantly, it evokes in me a deep sense of awe and relatedness to the much larger world outside of myself and my family sphere (i.e. the natural world and the human world). These days, we all need that.

As daylight shortens now, I am trying not to take for granted my last bike rides of the season. I do this by bathing in the sensory delights of my commute home from start to finish. Just the other day, I experienced: the crunch of fall leaves under tires, the smell of curry near the downtown restaurants, the sight of my favorite jasmine hedge. I passed five different sporting events (basketball, soccer, tennis, softball, volleyball) as well as hordes of runners, scooters and bikers. I watched numerous dogs bounding across the grass playing fetch, heard kids calling to their grownups at the playgrounds, felt the vibrations of the BART train from the elevated tracks, and took in the colorful murals I passed.

At one point, a basketball pinged my bicycle, and someone shouted an apology, but I couldn’t have cared less. I felt so alive.

Before the final climb uphill to my home, I snuck a view of the horizon above the rooftops. Giant, puffball clouds with flaming orange-pink underbellies reminded me of the vastness and beauty of this world.

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