Moving Slow...builds strength

Last night I could barely walk...most likely I have plantar fasciitis.  Even though it's extremely painful.  I know it is also a less in listening.  As I'm laying in bed, not wanting to get out and step down..I started thinking. How I decide this injury to be will be what it becomes.  Just like cleaning.  Cleaning can be a chore, a practice, a struggle, a gift.  How I look at an object or activity gives me my own meaning.  What if this injury is a Divine gift?  What if it is catapults me forward in the right direction?  What if it is the answer to a prayer?

When I walk very slowly, take tiny steps, mindfully and with beautifully tall posture...my foot has some relief.  I can move.  While I'm moving slow in my own home, to the north of me, my beautiful sister...who just had her little boy Penrhyn, a couple weeks ago😊, is also moving slow.  A leg injury from giving birth.  There is no option for either of us but to move slow...and keep going forward.

In one of my favorite books, Born to Run, Christopher McDougal talks about a Japanese training style for long distance runners. They train first by learning to walk ultra slow.  I would guess this gives your body a wisdom of movement, of core strength, built not just by the big and powerful muscles but also by the tiny and essential micro muscles and fascia.  Of which I have probably overruled most of my life. Overruled and ignored so I can move fast, while my mind over thinks and my body presses on. 

Choosing to shift my thinking from being injured to a new form of training shifts my emotions.  This shift my seem insignificant.  1 degree in another direction changes everything.  The shift is enormous.  Instead of fear, frustration and despair, I'm instantly transported in to curious, learning and exploration.  I'm in training.

My injury is ripe with a real world metaphor.  The tiny muscles of our body...can be over powered for a while but not forever.  Imbalance happen and when imbalance happens, our body/communities/country will at some point adjust. When ignored,the re-alignment is painful and untimely.   There is a natural flow of the universe...to come back to balance. 

Yesterday on my way home from a run, I was busy texting and calling people... I was far from present.  I pride myself in being present and loving my runs and nature...but I ran past my body talking to me, She tried to get me to listen...I ignored her.  This is what I have to say for myself

I'm sorry, please forgive me

Thank you, I love you

I'm listening

This Hawaiian prayer can be used for anything.  Today it is for my foot, our country, my spirit and those in the world I have ignored.  I thank Christopher McDougall for sharing this ancient practice of training ultra slow, to remind me that slow and mindful is not moving backwards but a legitimate way of moving forward. Life, when done fully present, builds a balanced and healthy foundation of both the tiny muscles and the large ones.  

May your journey be kind and wise...even when moving slowly.

            Denise