Running is Never about Running...

I just came back from an evening run. I haven't been running for almost two years, unless you count running after the bus or running to department office for a last-minute submission.

Why has it been so long, I wondered, but I knew the answer. To me, running has never been about running. It was never about keeping fit, losing weight, getting stronger or getting faster. Never. 

To me, running has always been about something else.

That is why I hate running on the tracks. For the most part, I am not interested in knowing how many kilometres I have covered, or how many minutes I took to complete the distance. 

The city and the streets look different when I am running. I love to run along Dover Road, especially in the evening, because I don't really have to worry about accidentally knocking someone down while I am running. 

Running gives me a sense of freedom, as I inhale the relatively clean evening air where there were no more vehicles on the streets, and feel the breeze invigorating my tired face. There were several other people, young and not-so-young, but mostly young, running across the street.

They could be wondering, "Why in the world would someone run so slowly?", as they see me running in what seems to be baby steps. I couldn't care less. Running has never been about running. Neither speed nor time was my concern.

Because, to me, running is about Space.

When I run, I create an utterly different space that exists nowhere else. My mindscape broadens, as it opens up to anything - anything at all - that comes to it. Running is about thinking. Running is about getting my other parts of the body busy so that my mind is free to wander as far as it wishes too. It serves everyone great, my mind was busy processing things that it will not send unnecessary pain signals to my body, and I can keep on the one-two-one-two motion as if it were automated.

When I run, I get new ideas, or simply have old ideas resurfacing. When I run, my brain is free to run its problem-solving mode undisturbed - solving some difficult problems in my life. Even if I do not get any problem solved, I would usually gain a new perspective, which would not have come together had I not keep my body in mundane repetitive motion like running or swimming.

I guess that explains why I have never been interested in game sports. They take up too much of my mind, and I don't like being preoccupied that way.

I love running.

I love swimming.

But most of all, I guess, I love exercising my mind.

Cheers.