Why Do I Run?

I have no idea.  I'm so sore right now.  The wife is about to watch Dancing With The Stars so I ponder.  Perhaps I am trying to regain my youth.  Perhaps I am simply trying to test my limits.  Of course, some people climb mountains to test their limits.  Some run across deserts.  Some swim across oceans.  It seems what I am asking of my body is not all that much.  Yet, my body is not cooperating.  It's not doing what I want it to do.  I refuse to accept that this is what 51 years old looks like for me.

In the picture above, I am 5 and my dad is in the background walking around the track.  I could run a mile in 9:00 when I was 5.  I have trouble keeping up that pace now.  I am hoping to be better once the snow is gone and I can run the trails more productively.

But...I'm lying to myself even now.  My legs are in rough shape.  I have some kind of shin pain.  I just looked it up on WebMD and it appears I likely just have simple shin splints.  I guess I never really understood what that truly is and how painful it can be.  I need to run on the front of my foot more (part of my laziness) and stay away from running on hard surfaces.  I figured out the latter on my own.

But...why do I run?  I started at a young age.  I took a break at 17 when I got confused with what was and who I was.  I was never the same runner again although I ran fairly regular through to my early 30s.  In organized sports I was forced to train regularly. I never took it tremendously seriously but left to my own devices, I slacked much more.

I wish I had today's drive in that young body.  Zen teaches that the past is the past.  It no longer exists.  I need to accept who I am today.  I am doing that on many levels.

Anyway...running.  I honestly don't know why it is so important right now.  It doesn't matter.  I should ride it out while I have the energy.  I just need to move...move with no apparatus...just my feet, body and mind.

I don't wear headphones.  I don't understand how anyone can have proper balance/coordination without hearing the world...hearing the wind, woods and critters.  I don't understand why anyone would block out the sounds of the woods or even the streets.  I love coming across critters in the woods.  This is cool:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkemK00kPo4

Stuff like that happens in the woods.  The marvelous randomness of the real world...


That was all written yesterday.  It is now today.  The question is: why do I run?  I think it is mainly the no apparatus aspect.  Like...you could run anywhere...even if you had no shoes...

There is definitely a Zen to running...the freedom of being alone in the woods with just one's thoughts.  Or to be Zen and have no thoughts. Only experience what is going on around you and specifically, what is in front of you.  Whatever.  I used to do some of my best thinking while I was running.  I was like a machine in my youth.  I didn't appreciate it back then.  It was my "normal."

Now I do running meditations...sometimes I think and sometimes I don't.  Wax on, wax off.

I think I have a good plan to eradicate the shin splints.  I looked up some stretches and exercises and will do them every day.

Why do I run?  Because I can...

Like riding a bike with hemorrhoids...

It's no secret...I love the woods and love riding in the woods.  I love to bring a camera as a way to document my journeys and take pictures of interesting things I find.  I don't have hemorrhoids in this picture.

In the photo above, I am at the start of a trail that runs for 78 miles from the Douglas State Forest in Douglas, MA to the ocean at Blue Shutter Beach in Charlestown, RI.  I know where the whole trail goes but have never ridden the whole length of it at once.  Some day I will.  Below is a picture of Blue Shutter Beach...nice place...

The world can be so beautiful and yet, so ugly.  The ugliest things in the world are greed and hate.  In Buddhism, it is simple: do good and don't do evil.

Life is full of pain.  I'm an empathic person and sometimes I feel like I carry the weight of the world on my shoulders.  Like my own pain is not enough, I must carry every one else's as well.  This may sound insane but it is who I am.  This is why, over the last few years, I have decided that there is more to life than spending a large amount of my waking hours selling software or cell phones or any variety of other crap to crappy people.  I think I have a higher purpose.  I'm working on figuring out what that is and what it looks like.  A good start would probably be to not call people crappy but some just are...and that is their problem and doesn't have to be mine.

I know what it doesn't look like.  Life doesn't look like people treating people like pieces of furniture.  It doesn't look like people controlling people or hurting people or taking from people.  It doesn't look like a guy riding a bike with hemorrhoids.

I am a member of a Buddhist community.  Life looks pretty good there.  Life moves slowly.  People care about each other.  They care about what they eat.  They don't care about having any more than they need.  If they have more than they need, they give the rest to others in need.  The people at the Zen Center remind me of what the Native people must have been like.

There is a TV in one of the common rooms at the Zen Center and I have never seen it on.  I have never seen a cell phone or iPad or computer of any kind in use there.  It makes me wonder: how much of the "stuff" that we have do we really need?  How much of the stuff that we don't have but feel we need do we, in fact, really need?

What is a need?  Do people even know any longer?  Real needs are things like: subsistence, protection, affection, understanding, participation, leisure, creation, identity and freedom.  This morning I spoke to a 92 year old gentleman named Roland at an assisted living community.  I have to tell you, he looked like he was in his 70s at the most.  He wore a big smile and was happy to spend some time talking to me and I was happy to talk with him.  Someone there called him the mayor.  I'm pretty sure most of Roland's needs were fulfilled.  I don't know for sure if he has affection in his life today but I think he does and I know he has the rest.

Roland is one of those angels you come across in your life.  He teaches you a lesson if you are open to receive it.  I want to spend more time with people like Roland.  I don't want to ride a bike with hemorrhoids.  That is just painful!