Mindful Athlete Course 2020

Let's see if we can approach our training more like an elegant dance and less like a struggle. As one of the classic analogies points out: pain is inevitable, struggle is optional.

True mindfulness practice can feel like a mental dance, between moments of stable concentration and open-hearted, non-judgmental awareness of everything around us.

So much is happening to us while we run if we only learn to pay attention. Can you hear the birds sing? Can you be aware of your physical and mental state without judgement?

We're now ready to open up our awareness fully, to everything going on within and around us. This is sometimes considered more advanced but it's really the most effective way to start integrating mindfulness into everyday life.

As we begin to move, our natural tendencies in training become more evident. Why are we doing this to ourselves? How can we get less carried away by our constant mood swings and take our practice forward?

Let's turn our attention to what motivates us to work out in the first place. Meditation is a form of mental training that can help us illuminate some of the underlying challenges and opportunities in our physical training.

Our mind generally appears a lot more distracted when we're in motion. Becoming mindful of thoughts here can be challenging and even brief moments of awareness can bring a lot of clarity in your workout.

Thoughts and other mental events are considered another foundation of mindfulness. We will now attempt to witness them as they appear, while sitting silently.

We all know that our emotional state during a workout can be volatile, to say the least. We'll now attempt to bring some awareness to the way gentle motion affects our mood.

We're now getting into the more subtle realm of consciousness, by learning to be mindful of our emotions. This is another one of the traditional foundations of mindfulness.