THIS IS MY BODY
I have always understood my relationship to my self through my relationship to my body.
I cannot qualify this as being good or bad.
I can only ask myself, where has this been helpful? Where has this been limiting? Where do I want to grow beyond this understanding?
As far as running goes, there is a definite link between how I relate to myself, and the kind of running practice I cultivate.
Is it legalistic and demanding; exhausting, linear? Is it fluid and intuitive; restful, and expansive?
Running as rest.
I’ve always known running to be restful, but it was Karly Borden (again!) who first gave me words to describe it that way.
It feels counterintuitive! But I think that is, in part, because most of the running we see represented in media is rooted in intensity– with a “no days off” mentality. This kind of running is measured in linear progress, and is therefore exhaustive, extractive, and let’s not forget, is usually trying to sell you something.
No, not every run is restful. Not the running done out of obligation or self-objectification, the running done to escape, or in an effort to belong.
And yet, the runs where I feel deeply connected to inhale and exhale; to the feeling of sun and wind on face; to the bead of sweat on temple; one in the early morning, in the quiet, in the dew, often with other people– I find this kind of running to be a form of renewal.
A way of disentangling myself from the structures and systems that tell me how I am supposed to be; a place where I feel myself become expansive.
That kind running gives me access to deep rest. Return to myself.