When I began running, I spent years looking for a reliable way to enter the fabled sports “zone.” I changed my breathing, stride, thoughts, and diet. I ran hard, easy, and in-between. I did intervals, long runs, tempo runs, and fartlek. I thought, “The zone is high energy plus relaxation,” so I ran hard, then backed off and tried to relax. But none of these methods brought the results I hoped for.
Occasionally I would imagine that I’d finally discovered the Holy Grail of running – the Grand Unified Theory – only to find in the end that it wasn’t a question of rules, but of inner attunement. After years of tinkering with the mechanics of the zone, I finally stopped looking for “The Method” and instead began asking for inner guidance, even though it seemed the least practical thing to do. Yet asking for help turned out to be the Mother Lode.
Running with my attention tuned to hear what the silent voice of intuition might tell me, I had many experiences of what I would broadly call “spiritual running.” Thus, when I stumbled on the harmony zone and Happy Heart running, it wasn’t as something revolutionary; rather they were a continuation and deepening of my earlier experiences. “Discovering” Happy Heart running, for example, merely confirmed my awareness that all my zone-like experiences had come by way of the heart.
As I learned to ask for help and listen in the heart for answers, I found those experiences coming more easily and often. Even if “big” experiences didn’t come – perhaps on a day when my mind was restless or my feelings were chaotic – focusing my attention in the heart always brought worthwhile rewards. Even if I only succeeded in “running in the heart” to a degree, I felt refreshed and healed, no matter that I didn’t have earth-shaking spiritual experiences.
If you want to explore fitness intuition, here’s my advice:
Don’t look for big experiences. Don’t strain. Take care of the details. And begin with the body.
Big experiences aren’t the point. The important thing is to work with yourself exactly as you are and go slowly, steadily forward. If your mind is distracted, or you feel upset, go ahead and feel crappy. Watch yourself feeling crappy. Watch intently, for a long time, and you may realize that the place from which you’re watching yourself is an enjoyable place to be.
If you can’t shake those feelings, drop back to the level of the body. Do your best. Put your attention wholly on your running. Know that as your rhythm and focus deepen, your mind and heart will follow. The magic ingredients aren’t tense effort and strain, but rhythm, attention, and time. Better to let the mind ramble, even for a long time if need be, than to try hard to force it to focus, which never works.
Pay attention to whatever you’re doing–thinking, breathing, running. This is the secret of Native American dancing and chanting: long-continued rhythmic repetition draws our being into a wonderful focus. With deepening focus comes growing inner stillness. And with stillness comes receptivity, communion with the higher Self, and ecstasy. Rhythm, focus, stillness. You may have experienced that these are powerfully healing.
Turn your attention to “just running.” It’s easier to think of mental focus as deep interest. When you’re genuinely interested in something, concentration takes hardly any effort. Watch the body and mind. If there’s awkwardness in your form, or disharmony in your thoughts and feelings, be aware of it but don’t judge it. Put judgment on the shelf. (Thinking, thinking, thinking!) Watch your thoughts, like a calm observer, but don’t judge them. Nobody is watching or judging you. Look for the least sign of harmony–even a tiny wisp. Your body, heart, and mind will always take time to get rolling rhythmically and smoothly. They’ll tell you, with subtle, small signals when they’re beginning to fall in sync–there’ll be a fleeting sense of harmony that lingers briefly, then fades. Have faith; it will return.
Maybe you’ll run thirty yards feeling moderately harmonious, then the jangly, discoordinated feeling will return. Books on meditation tell us this is a natural part of the process: you do your breathing exercises, prayers, and other practices and you begin to feel a little bit harmonious, then the mind’s restlessness returns. It takes patient repetition to encourage the mind to slow down, and it begins with the body. You make the twin “donkeys” of the body and mind work hard for a while, then you loosen the reins and give them a rest. In meditation, it begins with bodily exercises – breathing, tensing and relaxing, physical postures, and so on. For a runner, it begins with movement – slowly, patiently seeking a rhythm.
As the calm, intuitive heart begins to awaken, the first signal will be a passing, delicate sense of harmony. Don’t try to grab it. Don’t reach out for it. Just keep running. Fall into the song. Just keep dancing. Enjoy the moment. “Don’t worry – be happy.” Drop back and watch the body. Fall in and join its rhythm, make it the mind’s focus. Find the stillness within the heartbeat, the still point between restless thoughts. Be gently aware of the heart, and those feelings of harmony will grow deeper and stronger.
You may feel that you’ve touched a part of your heart that you haven’t visited for a long while, a part of you that is childlike and innocent, even after many difficult life experiences. Behind the armor and battle scars is the person who’s sincere, who can see the world with eyes of clarity and wonder. When you feel that part of yourself, don’t turn away – it is valuable. It’s the part of you that’s in touch with the Spirit at your source.
