Embodied mindfulness: How running helped me to cultivate empowering mental strategies
Running has never really been my thing. It always felt way too exhausting and boring at the same time. Some weeks ago, I decided to give it another try. I was ready for a little experiment. My new approach was to face this personal project from a mindful perspective. Mindfulness reflects the holistic concept of observing what is being shown in the present moment with full awareness and accepting the current situation without judging. By doing so, we increase the consciousness for ourselves and the world around us. The traditional way of cultivating mindfulness is meditation, especially the practice of breath observation. But as I want to highlight in this article, mindfulness can be practiced in many different ways. You do not have to become a yogi or a committed meditator to increase your level of awareness.
Already in the first weeks of my running experiment, I learned a lot about my internal programming. I found a new access to myself and realised that running is a perfect exercise for me to get in touch with some of my core beliefs and develop new, empowering mental strategies which did not only help me to improve my running performance, but also enrich my daily life in many different ways.
In the following, I would like to share 5 mental strategies I was able to strenghten through running.
1. Detecting and accepting negative beliefs and intentions
When I went for my first run, I decided to focus on my thoughts, beliefs and intentions, as they have been the reason why I have never been able to establish a running routine in the first place. When it comes to detecting unconscious beliefs and intentions, we need to be radically honest with ourselves. It is often uncomfortable, but only if we get to the root, we will be able to transform unhealthy patterns and establish an empowering mindset.
I started to observe what was going on in my mind and quickly realised how destructive and limiting the nature of my prevailing thoughts was. “You’ll never make it”, “you’re not good enough”, “this is ridiculous”, and so on. Definitely not the best mindset for starting running — or any other project. In addition, I investigated my intentions. The more I listened to myself, the more I understood that I had an urge to prove something to myself. My unconscious intention was to increase my running performance in order to proove myself that I can make it, that I am enough, and that I am not ridiculous.
From an energetic perspective, the feelings that drive our mental setup play a very crucial role. In general, beliefs and intentions can rather be based on lack and fear, or on joy and (self-) love. If we are predominantly in fear and lack mode, you can imagine that this will have a huge impact on our actions and the results we achieve.
Before we are able to transform our mindset and get into empowerment mode, we need to face our current situation with kindness and acceptance. By accepting our mental constitution just the way it is, we make sure that we do not cultivate any kind of self-directed anger and resistance. Instead, we embrace our current state and acknowledge that we didn’t know any better. In that way, we lay a compassionate basis on which we can then build a sustainable and supportive mindset.
2. Cultivating positive self-talk
After I had identified this intention and the negative thought spiral that was triggered while going running, I consciously decided to press the reset button. I understood that instead of being driven by the need for recognition, I wanted to establish an intrinsic motivation based on happiness. Running actually felt pretty good and I really enjoyed the feeling afterwards. This feeling of satisfaction became my new driver. It changed everything. I felt lighter and all of a sudden, running did not feel like a to do anymore. Instead, I started to honestly enjoy the process, without pressure, without longing for approval.
Each time I detected a negative thought, I replaced it with positive self talk. Complimenting myself felt quite strange at the beginning, but became more natural after a while. Slowly but steady, I was able to let go of that inner battle. Interestingly, I directly observed how this mental change positively affected my running performance. It triggered a positive spiral which made me feel worthy, powerful and deeply accomplished.
Positive self-talk needs to be practiced. It is not something that evolves over night. It takes time until it becomes a habit, but it is definitely worth working on it. It is a precious inner resource that fosters self-efficacy, motivation and satisfaction — not only when it comes to running, but in any kind of situation.
3. Setting small and realistic goals — and honouring each achievement
Another strategy that can be applied to any kind of professional or personal project is to set small and realistic goals. The first time I went running, my goal was to run for 15 minutes. The old me would have laughed at me, but I knew that any other aim would have resulted in the feeling of failure, shame, anger and probably the decision to cancel my project. Bit by bit, I extended the running distance and noticed a steady improvement. Honouring every little improvement was really important for me to keep my motivation high. It strengthened the positive perception about myself and made me feel like a winner. This positive feeling would influence my whole day and even have a positive effect on other areas of my life.
4. Letting go of comparison and focusing on oneself
We all compare ourselves, basically all the time. Although it is a natural pattern to check our position within a social context, comparison distances us from ourselves in many different ways.
From the very beginning, I promised to myself that I would not compare myself to any other runner out there. First it was hard for my ego to let others overtake me, but instead of following the inner urge to start a battle and increase in speed, I focused on myself; my breath, my body, my rhythm.
It became my new mantra and helped me to stay connected to myself and adapt to my current energy level. In this process, focusing on my breathing was extremely helpful. Sometimes I even caught myself drifting off in a meditative state, forgetting everything and everyone around me. In these flow states, where I was completely in tune with myself, I was overcome by a feeling of ease and pure fulfillment.
Flow is a highly energizing state, which we can only experience if we are 100% focused. As long as our mind is wandering around, attached to what others do or achieve, we are too disconnected from our own potential to be able to get into flow.
5. Practicing patience and trust in the process
Last but not least, my little running experiment taught me to become more patient with myself. Patience has never been my strength. Still, some things need time. So instead of trying to find a shortcut and forcing myself too much in order to assure that I will eventually achieve my overall running goal, I let go and started to focus more on the process.
The less we trust, the more we control. The less we control, the more space we create for our potential to unfold and magic to happen. While trust is an inner state that fuels us with energy and positive feelings, control oftentimes leads to tension, stress and dissatisfaction. And by the way, progress is not linear and therefore cannot always be controlled. We can try to optimise the outer circumstances and stick to certain behaviours, but we will never be able to fully control the results. The beauty of trust is that it connects us to our intuition. To trust means to cultivate a strong inner belief that things will work out and that we are able to achieve what we want to achieve. Trust leads to openness and fosters warm feelings, while the urge to control leads to narrowness and triggers our fear body.
I do not know 100% if I will achieve my running goals, just as little as I know 100% if I will achieve all the other goals I have in life. But I know that the best thing I can do is to keep going and enjoy the ride, with an open heart and open eyes.
