35 Moving Meditations for Runners

Transcription

1 Running Home 35 Moving Meditations for Runners by Toby Estler Robert D. Reed Publishers Bandon, OR

2 Copyright 2007 by Toby Estler All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher or copyright holders, except for a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review; nor may any part of this book be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or other, without written permission from the publisher or copyright holders. Robert D. Reed Publishers P.O. Box 1992 Bandon, OR Phone: Fax: bobreed@msn.com web site: Editor: Cleone Lyvonne Cover: Cleone Lyvonne Author Photos: Angus Ross Illustrations: Kim Garrison Typesetter: Barbara Kruger ISBN Library of Congress Control Number Manufactured, typeset and printed in the United States of America

3 13 Be Your Own Hero Quality: Self-Acknowledgment Where have all the heroes gone? They ve gone with the simplicities and the pieties and the easy answers of another era. Our lack of heroes is an indication of the maturity of our age. A realization that every man has come into his own and has the capability of making a success out of his life. But also that this success rests with having the courage and endurance and, above all, the will to become the person you are, however peculiar that may be. Then you will be able to say, I have found my hero and he is me. George Sheehan, Running and Being Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our darkness, that frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn t serve the world. There s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won t feel insecure around you. You were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within you. It s not just in some of us; it s in everyone. And as we let our own Light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we re liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. Marianne Williamson, Return to Love

4 62 Running Home I no longer own a television, and haven t for a number of years now seven or eight at least. I first tried giving it up when I was in my mid-20s. I turned the cheap color TV in my studio apartment on its side and covered it with a piece of Indian cloth. For two years, it functioned as a table. Then there came along a moment in history that was greater than my pledge. I unveiled my TV and sat glued to the images transmitted live via satellite from South Africa. After 27 years in jail, Nelson Mandela was walking free from his prison cell. He looked uncomfortable in his city suit as he walked back into a South Africa, and a world, that would need to stretch to accommodate his visionary thinking. The camera panned back from Mandela to a throng of supporters just outside the prison that danced and sang in the inimitable rhythms of Soweto township music. As I watched them celebrate, as I saw and felt their jubilation, my tears started to flow. The love that they held for this man, and the dreams of the new nation that he represented, washed over me. When, ten years later, a group of young men came to my local church to dance the traditional dances of the South African coal miners, my reaction was the same and stronger. Two dozen men in their 20s and 30s, the Rishile Gumboot Dancers of Soweto, swayed and drummed their feet in century-old isicathulo, the golden bells on their boots ringing out as they did so. I recognized that these men had been born into, grown up in, and endured through the height of the apartheid regime. Many of their fellow countrymen and women had not survived. As they were growing up, many of their friends and family, neighbors, and community leaders had been arrested, disappeared, or killed. As my gaze met that of one of the dancers, the blaze of life in his eyes communicated to me the resilience of a whole nation; the determination of an entire people; the strength of heart, patience, and resolve to keep holding a focus on freedom amidst all the rigors of the long years of apartheid. All these qualities were touched inside of me; and a level of compassion, understanding, and admiration I had never experienced before flowed through my heart. My mind

5 Be Your Own Hero 63 flashed back ten years to the image of Mandela as he had walked free from prison. Right there in the church I began to cry, and I again let my tears flow freely. My wife embraced me as I shook with sobs. The beauty that I saw in these men, and the indomitable human spirit they embodied, had thrown my heart wide open. In the days that followed, I began to ask myself, Why had I been so moved by this experience in particular? As I searched for an answer to this question, I came to understand that I saw these men as exceptional human beings they displayed qualities that I did not see in myself. I saw them as heroes. As runners we have our heroes, too. As a younger man in England, long before I ran myself, I was nonetheless inspired by the great middle distance runners, Steve Ovett and Sebastian Coe. Who is your favorite runner of all time? Grete Waitz, perhaps, or Steve Prefontaine? Kip Keino, Paavo Nurmi, or Joan Samuelson? Carol Lewis or Paul Tergat maybe? Or is it someone who has contributed so much to the running community an Arthur Lydiard, Bill Bowerman, or Frank Shorter? There are so many to choose from. Perhaps there is someone in your running club or Sunday morning runners group that you admire. While the level of talent is evident in all these people, it is also the qualities that this talent is built upon that we often admire most. Endurance, perseverance, self-discipline, vision, and the strength of heart to overcome challenges these are all attributes that carry almost hypnotic properties for us as runners. Often, we are more willing to see certain qualities in others than we are to see them in ourselves. We need to be vigilant and willing to take responsibility for the very best in us. By not fully embracing our magnificence, we allow ourselves to remain in familiar and safe territory, which can mean living at less than our best. Surprisingly, it can be very uncomfortable to let go of our own diminished image of ourselves. We can feel very at home in the denial of our own incredible potential, both as runners and in the wider arena of our lives. When we open

6 64 Running Home our hearts to our own magnificence, we move into a clearer experience of who we truly are spiritual beings living a human life. In this way, we begin to set free, from within, the vision that Spirit has for our lives. As you run today, bring your awareness to someone that you admire. It may be someone that is not a runner or an athlete at all. Let your heart bring this person into focus. It could be a high school teacher, a family member, a historical figure, or a character in a novel. Whoever it is that you choose, make sure it is someone who has aroused strong, positive feelings in you: a person that you would wish to emulate. As you run, try to distill the particular qualities that you admire in them. What is it that you most appreciate in this person? Is it courage? Compassion? Do they embody selfless service? Could it be patience? It may well be a mix of a number of different traits that make up this person s way of being, but try to hone in on what it is that stands out from the blend. Once these qualities are clear to you, you are at a point of choice a branching in the road of your spiritual path. On the one hand, you could continue to celebrate these qualities solely in this other person. On the other hand, you could recognize that the place inside of you where those qualities reside has been more fully awakened. Whenever we are moved deeply by another s way of being, we have the opportunity to claim more of that way of being for ourselves. We can see our own reflection more clearly in the mirror of another s actions. Simply put, If you can spot it, you ve got it! As you move through your day, notice when you are touched or inspired by others. It may be by what they do or by the way that they do it. Perhaps you will notice how willing you are to see these features in others and not in yourself. We can become used to seeing ourselves in a certain way we become stuck in a rut of our own limited perception of ourselves, choosing to project our creativity and our magnificence onto others. There is immense power available through reclaiming our inherent goodness.

7 Be Your Own Hero 65 For me, both in the moment that Nelson Mandela walked free from prison and as I watched the Gumboot Dancers, I was put in touch with the incredible courage, resolve, and strength of heart that had carried me through my own difficult childhood and multiple addictions. I reconnected with the place in me where the spark of life had always burned, no matter how the storm in and around me had fought to blow it out. From this day forward, choose as often as you can to own the goodness, the God-ness, that you are. Claim for yourself the gift of your own magnificence. As you continue to acknowledge and honor positive qualities in others, also take a moment to remind yourself that you would not recognize those qualities in others unless they also resided in you. Affirmation I am honoring God, myself, and others, as I reclaim the magnificence and inherent goodness of who I truly am.

8 15 Running Young Quality: Playfulness But if the dance of the run isn t fun, then discover another dance, because without fun the good of the run is undone, and a suffering runner always quits sooner or later. Fred Rohe, The Zen of Running There often seems to be a playfulness to wise people, as if their equanimity has as its source this playfulness. Edward Hoagland I like to talk about running both to hear from other runners about their experience and to share about the transformative effect that running has had in my life. When asked how much I run, my reply is, Between 20 and 30 miles a week. Wow, they often respond. You are a serious runner. I try not to be, I say and I am not joking! I have met plenty of other runners who, when they started to become serious about their running, got exactly that serious. I ve been there myself. We become so absorbed in the details of what we are doing that we lose

9 72 Running Home perspective. We begin to confuse mastery with seriousness, to sacrifice joy on the altar of commitment. Do you remember how, as a young child, an ongoing commentary ran through your mind as you would play? All too often as adults, we can be tuned into a stream of hurtful comments and put-downs that runs a loop in our minds without even so much as a commercial break! As young children, our commentary was quite different it was dramatic, encouraging, and enthusiastic. Maybe, like me, you even spoke the commentary out loud. As I rode my bicycle up and down our street, I was the sheriff riding to save the town at the last minute. When I was kicking a soccer ball with my dad, I was the young star scoring the last goal that saved the game. When I was doing my homework, I was the top scientist, cracking a code that would save the planet from invasion. Crazy? Possibly. Did I have fun? Absolutely! Do you notice how kids have the get-up-and-go to play for hours and never run out of steam? It s because they are living in the natural world of their dreams a place of boundless energy, inspiration, and joy. Not long ago, I read James E. Shapiro s outstanding book, Meditations from the Breakdown Lane. It is a fascinating journal of his internal and external experience as he ran the 3,000 miles across the United States, averaging 40 miles a day every day for 80 days. Now, this is not something I am planning to do! However, in my running recently, I have had immense fun using this as my fantasy. Even if I am running for only 20 minutes, and that s all that I have time for that day, I imagine myself somewhere on the transcontinental trail: This is without doubt one of the great sporting achievements of this century. We watch now as Toby Estler, the first Englishman to run across the United States, begins to cross the George Washington Bridge. He has completed the 3,026 miles from Dillon Beach, California, in only 75 days. What a fantastic ambassador for his country. His quest has been a celebration of the human spirit

10 Running Young 73 I return from these runs with an extra spring in my step exultant and inspired. There have been many times when spending my run in this playful and expansive way has brought the dividend of new and creative solutions to problems that I have been stuck on for quite a while. I like to think that rather than cleanliness, it is playfulness that is next to Godliness. Whenever I hear laughter, I know that Spirit is present. When I give myself permission to experience within me the presence and innocence of a playful child, I reconnect with the God, and the good, in me. During your run today, give yourself the gift of your own world-saving, record-breaking, death-defying commentary from the moment the theme from Rocky starts playing as you leave home until you return to applause from a capacity-filled stadium. Let this gift stretch through all of your day. Be the world s greatest mom; be the chef at a fivestar Paris restaurant; be the world s greatest lover! Play! Play! Play! Affirmation I am living in joy, playing into the hands of God.

11 About the Author After traveling extensively in Europe, Asia, Australia, Southern Africa, and North America over the course of ten years, Toby Estler moved to the United States from his native England in 1994, amidst virulent rumors of an expulsion personally demanded by then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. He does all that he can to perpetuate those rumors. Since landing in the United States, he has grown up and become a husband, father, author, poet, seminar leader, and life coach. He holds a Master s Degree in Spiritual Psychology from the University of Santa Monica and is a member of the Los Angeles Poets and Writers Collective. He also makes a truly remarkable leek and potato soup. One of the millions of runners that head out each day in search of peace, meaning, and inspiration, he can currently be found running along the beaches, rivers, trails, and roads of Southern California, where he lives with his wife Teresa and daughter Hayden. Blending well over a decade s management and leadership experience in sales and marketing with the additional strengths and qualities developed through running (as well as some very particular skills learned at Her Majesty s pleasure in Britain s Wormwood Scrubs Prison), Estler now

12 188 Running Home offers inspirational life coaching to individuals and groups in both personal and business settings. You can enjoy daily uplifting quotes, additional running and exercise meditations, as well as thoughtful, inspirational reflections at his website: To share your experience of using the material in this book, request information about his coaching and seminar availability, or to receive his leek and potato soup recipe, you can him at