A Part of Hearst Digital Media, but as I ran up a steep trail, 8,000 feet above sea level, I was breathing so hard that my mind could barely keep up. I was about a mile into a 2.5-mile run. Dry air filled my throat, my leg muscles burned, and all I could hear was my own panting breath. I hated that sound. Each heavy gasp for air reminded me of how tired I was, which then ushered in the thought that I was desperately trying to avoid: stop running. Usually I block out that thought by dialing up the volume on my iPod, filling my ears with Britney Spears and the Pussycat Dolls, or thinking about what I will wear that day, what I will write in an e-mail to a friend, and what I'll eat later—any mental project that will distract my mind from the present pain.
Unfortunately, for the next three days I was supposed to avoid those distractions. I had arrived with 37 other runners at The Shambhala Mountain Center, a remote Buddhist retreat in Red Feather Lakes, Colorado, for a program called &But sitting and running are really different that promised to teach me to meditate while I run. I would learn how to be completely present, with my mind free of all discursive thoughts and focused completely on my breath, the surrounding environment, and the way my body feels. This iPod-free exercise would bring more peace, compassion, and sanity to my daily life, and it would also make me a better runner. Or so I hoped.
Thinking only about your breath might sound like an easy task, but people spend their entire lives mastering this meditation practice. I know this intimately because I am a so-called Dharma Brat, which means my parents, who became Buddhists in their 20s, raised my brother and me in their tradition. While other kids were memorizing Bible verses or preparing for Bat Mitzvahs, we were practicing "M&M Meditation" (focus on every sensation of each individual M&M instead of stuffing a handful in your mouth) and reading "If you give a mouse a cookie, he's going to ask for a glass of milk" as an illustration of the principle that all suffering comes from desire.
Since graduating from these Buddhist Sunday School classes, I've had a complicated and often-fluctuating relationship with Shambhala Buddhism. Although I can see the emotional and psychological benefits of meditation, I also sometimes feel pressured to follow my parents' religious path without being sure that it's really right for me. I even briefly rebelled in college by becoming an Evangelical Christian for a few months. I've since completed five "Shambhala Training" meditation programs, but I never considered applying meditation techniques to running. To me, the two activities could not be more different. But Jon Pratt, co-director of "Running with the Mind of Meditation and Yoga," says that the program was created partly because of their similarities. Although one is sedentary and the other is anything but, both activities require discipline and consistency. In fact, like running, meditation can be seen as a form of training. "Just as your body becomes stronger and more accustomed to running through training, your mind becomes stronger and more able to focus and stay calm and present through meditation," says Pratt, a veteran runner who's completed two Ironmans and 20 marathons (including a PR of 2:40). Instead of pushing himself to run faster or fantasizing about winning a big race, he now meditates while he runs 90 percent of the time. I listened skeptically as he described how meditation has allowed him to give up his competitive urges and run for pure enjoyment again. If I ran only because I liked it, I was pretty sure that all I could train for would be a five-minute jog through the park.
When I started running, I loved the feeling of my legs moving, the validation of a good sweat, and the pride I felt as I worked up to longer and longer runs. But somehow in the course of training for three half-marathons and one marathon, running had become a drudgery, another chore to check of my list. And as with any other chore, music and daydreaming helped the time pass more quickly. On a 19-mile training run last year, my iPod broke 15 miles in and, unable to bear the silence, I turned around and headed home. Although I'd heard about the meditative running program when it first started, it wasn't until after my marathon that I decided to give it a try. I figured that I could learn to love running again by doing it distraction-free while surrounded by the rugged beauty of Colorado's mountain trails.
Six months after signing up for the program, I was forcing my legs to climb up that dusty trail. I kept my head down and watched my running shoes, now brown with dirt, land between the rocks and roots that covered the path. The bright sun made my eyes squint and my arms and legs burn, and the hot air made me very sorry I hadn't brought a water bottle. Pratt had promised that eliminating my usual distractions would help calm my mind so I could experience the pure joy of running, but as my noisy breath echoed in my head, I started to wonder if my search for that joy would make me stop running for good.
Advertisement - Continue Reading Below of the program, all of the runners sat in a circle in a meditation room, their shiny jackets and spandex pants looking mismatched with the elegant simplicity of the room's red meditation cushions and glossy wood floor. The group members ranged from a shaman who says he goes into trances while he runs to a cheerful blonde with a long-haired Chihuahua named Martini, but many were there for the same reason. Like me, they had lost the joy in running and had seen it become something else: a duty, a source of stress, or a constant reminder of how they wished they could do more.
Pratt's source for the answers to these problems looks nothing like your typical running expert. The 47- year-old Sakyong Jamgon Mipham Rinpoche, spiritual leader of more than 221 Shambhala Centers, or Buddhist meditation halls and meeting places around the world, is a revered Tibetan lama and is believed to be an incarnation of a famous 19th century Tibetan master named Mipham the Great. He has written two best-selling books on meditation and Shambhala principles and has spent his life cultivating his own meditation practice, sometimes living in monasteries or spending months in solitary retreats. And despite a Tibetan tradition that venerated teachers not do prosaic things like exercise, the Sakyong loves to run.
Over the past six years, the Sakyong has run eight marathons, including a PR of 3:05 in Chicago in 2006. While he normally drapes himself in flowing yellow and maroon silk robes, he runs in shorts, singlets, and New Balances and peppers his teachings with words like "tempo run," "speedwork," and "hill training." Pratt told me that the Sakyong is so peaceful and content when he runs that he could do a marathon on a treadmill.
Meditative running, the Sakyong believes, is an extension of the basic meditation practice that is performed while sitting on a cushion, which teaches you to keep your mind focused on your breathing, or following each breath as it flows out of your lungs. When your mind becomes distracted by other thoughts, you acknowledge it and return your focus to your breath. "Through meditation we learn to relax and yet be keenly aware of our moment-to-moment sensations, thoughts, and the world around us," Pratt says. "We set an intention to let go of daydreaming, fantasizing, and problem solving. By letting go of thoughts and coming back to our immediate physical experience, we find that our body so" ens and our mind feels lighter, more joyful."
The Sakyong, who taught the program himself in its first two years, is a big believer in meditative running not only as a way to calm the mind and enhance joy but also to improve running ability. "Running meditation is less one-dimensionally focused," the Sakyong has said. On the second night of our program, we watched a video of one of the Sakyong's talks from two years before. In it, he described the benefits of meditation and running, and also addressed students' specific running questions, including how to do hill workouts (keep the gaze high, maintain good posture, and "deal with it one thing at a time") and how to get "in the zone" (when the mind begins to relax through meditative running, we become more aware of the environment and attain a synchronicity with our surroundings). The Sakyong said that meditation allows runners to avoid injuries because they are more in tune with their bodies and aware of their surroundings, and that it can help runners perform better by giving them more control over their thoughts.
"When you run, occasionally you have a pain here and there, but a lot is mental," the Sakyong said. "If you work with the mind, sustain it, then you will not let the mind become rotten, or let it deflate you and overcome your confidence."
Each of the three days in the program followed a similar schedule: sitting meditation, running, lunch, more sitting meditation, and yoga. "I was with the Sakyong on this long trip through India, Taiwan, Singapore, and Hong Kong, and it was extremely difficult to find a good place to run," Pratt told the group after one session. "Then this one night in Singapore, we found a path along the ocean, this long bike path, and we just ran and ran and ran. At the end of the run, the Sakyong sat down and was inspired to come up with a poem. It reads, 'Tantalizing, trepidatious/I move one foot in front of the other./I am a runner. There is no greater joy in the three worlds... May this incredible experience of movement be the source of all happiness.'"
Although I appreciated the poem's beauty and could picture Pratt and his teacher peacefully running side by side through the dark, I still couldn't help but think that the Sakyong's joy about running was a little annoying.
Health & Injuries at meditative running with the group with pure intentions, leaving my iPod on my bed. Within two minutes, there was my pesky breath, nagging me like a gloomy running buddy who won't stop saying, "We have so much farther to go." I forced myself to focus on Pratt's instructions. "Keep your mind on your breath and the rhythm of your feet," he had said. "Those footstrikes and that breath will keep you in the present moment. When your mind starts to wander, bring it back to your feet or your breath."
I decided the thought that I hate the sound of my breath could actually be a distraction from my focus on my breath. Then I remembered something the Sakyong had said when he was asked about how to treat the pain we feel when we run. "I think if we are not trying to shut pain out, and live with it, the mind is less blocked, because you're not thinking, I hope I never get painful," he said. "The reality is, frankly, part of being a human being is pain, and that has to be included in the whole process." I realized that if you work through the pain, or in my case, let's be honest, just the temporary lack of enjoyment, there are some substantial rewards: There is the feeling of accomplishment at the end of a run, the joy of setting a training goal and completing it, and the knowledge that running makes me stronger and gives me energy throughout the day. Somewhere along the way I seemed to have forgotten this.
I had also always known that discipline in meditation practice can bring rewards, but suddenly I could see how that discipline paralleled running. The Sakyong says that although no one would think they could walk out the door one day and run a marathon, people expect to meditate for 15 minutes and begin feeling peace. But just like in running, you have to train your mind to get it used to being more peaceful and less attached to its thoughts. My mind cycled through these thoughts as I ran, until suddenly I had the experience that happens over and over again during meditation: I realized I'd been spacing out, that my mind was nowhere near the rhythm of my feet or the pattern of my breath, and I woke up. I enjoyed a fleeting moment of being completely present in my surroundings before my mind drifted again to thinking that it was almost time for lunch. I looped back to the dining hall, wondering how I'd make it through the next day's meditative run. That afternoon, one of the program's leaders gave me an answer by reminding me of something the Sakyong says off en: "Keep it simple." "It's almost impossible to be present the entire time while you run," she said. "But you can do it gradually. Start by running for 15 minutes with your music on to get into your groove and then turn it off and try to meditate. Set a goal of half a mile, or 200 paces, or once around a track." That sounded like something I could handle.
With these instructions in mind, I set out on the last night of the program for a solo run. Some of the participants had gone on a 10.5-mile trail run that morning, but I opted out, saying that I wanted to try meditative running alone (while also thinking that I would never survive that distance in the heat and elevation). I start the run with the Pussycat Dolls' "When I Grow Up" blasting in my ears. When I pass a family of deer watching me from a nearby meadow while The Dolls sing, "When I grow up, I wanna be famous, I wanna be a star, I wanna be in movies," I begin to feel a little silly. I reach down and switch o" the iPod.
At first, all I can hear is my usual gasping breath, and immediately I feel tired and weak. When I check my watch and see I have only run for five minutes, I start bargaining with myself about doing less. Then I reach The Great Stupa of Dharmakaya, a 108-foot tall monument that holds the ashes of the Sakyong's father, the Tibetan teacher who brought Shambhala Buddhism to the United States. I begin to circle the gravel path around the structure, focusing on the intricate patterns of spirals, clouds, and flowers carved into its walls. I run around the Stupa five times and try to notice something different each time—the flowers growing around its base, the noise of nearby birds, and the way the gravel path is darker in places where it's wet. On the fourth lap, I notice that there are benches surrounding the entire path. How had I not seen them before, especially when I was so desperate to stop and rest? I laugh at myself, then head down a trail that passes between the prayer flags and notice that each set of flags is colored differently—white, orange, red, and blue.
My breathing has slowed, my legs feel stronger, and I am not desperate to quit. I look at my watch again and note that another 20 minutes have gone by, and although I'm glad that time is passing quickly, I'm also enjoying myself. When I stop running, something magical happens. My normal feeling of relief at getting my chore done is missing, and in its place is a calmness and sense of enjoyment. I reach the dining hall but pause before I enter, realizing something astonishing. I'm actually looking forward to my run the next day
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quot;Running with the Mind of Meditation and Yoga"? Meditative running is just another form of basic meditation, says Jon Pratt, co-director of the three-day program "Running with the Mind of Meditation and Yoga." "When we run with presence, we are fully aware of our foot striking the earth, the rhythm of our breathing, and the path in front of us," Pratt says.
Running Supports This Marathoners Sobriety. You are still following your breathing and trying to eliminate distracting thoughts, but your focus is extended to your footsteps and an awareness of your surroundings, says the Sakyong, the program's founder and 3:05 marathoner. "The object of mindfulness is more your environment, how your body is feeling, and keeping within that area."
Running From Substance Abuse Toward Recovery? Both activities require discipline and consistency—just as you need a good base to run a marathon, you need a regular meditation practice to begin to feel its benefits. "Runners are used to working with inner experiences," Pratt says. "To run long distances, they have to work through boredom and fatigue, and they're used to dealing with adversities."
Advertisement - Continue Reading Below? Pratt says meditation can actually help runners get through a training program by preventing us from becoming overwhelmed by worries, doubts, or other negative thoughts. For example, when you look at the upcoming week's training schedule and see a 16-mile run, you might think, "There's no way I can do that run." Meditation can help you recognize that thought as what it is—just a thought, not reality—and then let it go. You can say, "That's how I feel now, but let's prepare for Sunday and see how I feel then."
NYC Marathoner Ran Home After Chemo? Running Was His Life. Then Came Putins War (shambhalamountain.org). With these instructions (solboundadventures.com) hosts retreats that include running, yoga, meditation breathing techniques, and visualization exercises. One World Running (oneworldrunning.com) gives one-day meditation, running clinics, and yoga workshops led by former elite runners and meditation practitioners. ChiRunning (chirunning.com) offers a variety of workshops that teach a blend of running and T'ai Chi, a meditative Chinese martial art.
