This is part three of a series answering the question of Why I
Run.
My life is full of noise. There is the near constant hum of a machine working to keep me at my desired temperature and the sounds that manage to penetrate the insulated boxes I live and travel within. My field of view is noisy with messages to buy this or believe that. There is the noise that I invite in, like the radio I’ve turned on that I’m not even listening too and the stream of texts, status updates, and emails that I allow to fill my days. And that is just the external noise.
Internally, the noise can be even louder, a barrage of thoughts and feelings, self-critiques, and observations about everyone and everything, creating a cacophony of distorted realities. The days pass with my mind continuously turning over the past, planning (or more likely just worrying about) the future, or jumping from distraction to distraction in an attempt to stop thinking about past and future. All of it is just noise.
But there are moments when I am running when all of the noise drops away. The quiet of the forest envelops me, and sometimes, if I’m fortunate, my internal chatter settles like debris drifting to the bottom of a still pool of water and for brief moments, there are no more thoughts. At these times, there is nothing but the sensations of my body moving with every living and non-living thing surrounding me and there is no separation between any of it. Thought becomes irrelevant, the past and future merge into the now. This is why I run. I run to find the silence where all is one.
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