shimmering and lovely and sad...."
Today I had a really nice run. I always listen to music when I run because it keeps my body in a beat and moving. Sometimes I think that music can impart its own energy into me. I don't know why this is but it does help when running several miles. What I've started to notice is that the run is becoming more a time for my mind to process things than just an exercise of the body.
I've had a couple of runs now that were quite productive, mentally speaking. After the initial shock for my body of, "Dear god here he goes again... Does anyone in here know why he has us running? Is something chasing him? Are we trying to get somewhere because I think we're going in circles!?" Yes, after that shock wears off I get into the rhythm and then a calm where I can think about things thoroughly, without distraction. I find myself pouring over things I need to do and get lost in planning ways to solve whatever is on my mind. Today it was working on a newspaper project that I'm needing to do with my students and I am really excited about what I brainstormed. It felt great to come up with a plan that I can use to take action.
I also had time during the run where I wasn't thinking much about anything. I used these times to consciously try and be in the moment. This is never an easy thing to do. Just opening up and experiencing what is going on around myself without thinking about what I did earlier or what I am going to do later takes a lot of mental effort. There are brief moments where I succeed and I'm awed by all that is around that goes unnoticed. And it's normally the stuff that I think gets dismissed as unimportant: Feeling the temperature on my skin change as I move from the sun to the shade and back again, the smell of the mud where the water is pooling, a bird chirping up on a tree branch, the colors that the leaves are starting to turn, a slight breeze on my skin, water dripping from my elbow.... And in those brief moments that I am witness to I smile and remember that life is good.
However you can't live in a single moment. Moments are fluid and move with time; ever changing. If a moment is frozen and time were to stand still then it would no longer have any substance. I think this is what bothers me about taking pictures of events all the time. These frozen moments don't really hold much interest for me. They can inspire memories of what was actually happening but frequently I find them empty. Furthermore, it would seem that some people sacrifice an actual experience to take lots of small potentially meaningless snapshots. I believe that the most important thing about a moment that you are experiencing is seeing and feeling the change that it makes in your life. It is the awareness of change that causes you to truly appreciate it.
I think this is the challenge of living in now. The moment is not static. Now is not static. It is not something that you can hold onto. It is always moving forward at the speed of life and never staying still. This makes keeping pace with it difficult. It's easier to race ahead and see what is down the road or to look in the rear-view mirror and see what is behind than to keep at the speed limit. However, in those small moments where I do stay in the now I find happiness. Life is good!
"Oh if life were only moments,
even now and then a bad one.
But if life were only moments
then you'd never know you had one...
Let the moment go...
Don't Forget it for a moment though."
-Into the Woods, Stephen Sondheim
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