Parking Lots...

Well, if yesterday was running bliss, on the wooded trails of Indiana... Saturday was the opposite. Today I ran from our hotel in Lafayette, across the parking lots and back lot fields of the main strip... taking in the invasive smells of fast food and car exhaust. However, the beautiful warm Spring sun faded out the lackluster backdrop, and it was still a pleasant (yet again short) run.

The terrain did have the positive effect of keeping things on the slow side, and this helped make it a relatively pain free run.

I have been thinking a great deal about how impatient I have been since the loss of my father. I didn't post anything this year on the passing of my Dads birthday (March 28)... However, I did write a bit here, and I think the thoughts show a parallel again on my path of running and grief. Through the process of losing my father I gained new insights about this world (and my own place in it), but it also brought a sense of helpless-urgency that is often difficult to tame. I tend to lose sight of the importance of steady progress, and more importantly... the freedom of being able to enjoy that process. When I set out to get in shape a few years ago (the beginningof this blog) I merely wanted to get back to someplace (regain a footing). I was able to use running as a tool to help me do that, but I had problems sustaining it. I lacked a certain discipline to continue building, and was missing an element of my own curiosity to see what each run would bring (both physically and mentally). For most of my life, running (like many things) was simply part of the routine, something I felt I needed to do (rarely exploring why). The last few months I have found myself struggling... sinking into many of the dark (and all to familiar) places... I often call this Unattended Sorrow. As Spring awakens the landscape, I am hoping to awaken my own understanding of the tools at my disposal. Running is one of those tools I will use to remind me of the ongoing processes of my fitness, and my life... Small steps, adding up to an ongoing path that is me.

Today: 2+ miles
Week: 5 miles

Mindfulness

No run today, but I wanted to share the opening words of the chapter that I read today (Unattended Sorrow, by Stephen Levine)... It built so well upon the things that I was thinking yesterday during my run.

MINDFULNESS IS KNOWING WHAT YOU ARE DOING WHILE YOUR ARE DOING IT- experiencing your life not as an afterthought but as a living presence.

Those were powerful words for me this morning, and I thought I would share.

A Walk...

So far today has been about walking... I am reading a book (may have mentioned it before) called Unattended Sorrow by Stephen Levine, and the chapter that I read today was about taking a walk with yourself. It seemed very fitting after what I wrote yesterday. What it was saying was to take a walk and let in all the information around you, open yourself up to your life and where you are at... sort of like a moving meditation. It is hard. It is hard not to focus on where you are going, or that you should get out of the rain, or that homeless guy asking for change... it is hard not to get lost in those things or the flip side to just ignore them. But the goal being to remain right in the middle. Aware that those things are part of your walk, but so is the sensation of your feet making contact with the ground, and your breathing, and the tightness in your stomach (that is one of mine). (I will have to finish this later... parking meter is out of time... to be continued)

Ok, part two... well, I guess the bottom line is that I am need of practice. I need to see ALL that input as part of my life, good & bad. And as I bring up my awareness of the world around me, I will begin to see the balance once again... instead of just the pain and sorrow that I am often swamped in now. I have these small glimpses that put it all in perspective, and I want sooo badly to hang on to those moments. However, they are just moments, not unlike the "moments" of confusion, fear and hoplessness. Someday those too will wash freely in and out of me...

Going for a night run later...