Welcome To Natural Running!

I ask myself: Where have I been with 20 years of teaching Natural Running? Where do I want to go to in creating of the Natural Running website. But the key question is, as always: Where am I now?  The effort this question demands is to be present, to fully connect to the rich detail of a living, moving body. To open in this way means to free myself of mind-made limitations and enter into the spirit and essence of running. I connect to this essence as a common-wealth –  a common-wealth built into the gene pool of the Running People, within every human being. A bare unfettered foot contacting the ground is a symbol of connection,  a present centered responsiveness, a constant adaptation to an ever changing terrain. It demands an alert and wakeful presence. It nourishes a sense of being an integral part of the Earth – a part of the essence and spirit of running.

In that awakened state there are no comparative thoughts such as 'Am I the best? Am I the winner'.  There is only the one present-centered concern, 'Am I free?'.  To lock-up, to be bound by ego and habit is to lose connection.  The spirit and essence of running always frees and opens.  The more the freeing possibilities open-up, the clearer the Disconnection in modern lifestyles is revealed.  The teaching and development of the Natural Running Course, continually challenges the Disconnect. It is a line to be crossed in a process of re-connection.

A barefoot hitting rugged ground opens and pours itself into a rich unfolding of tiny details.  But the infinitesimally small opens and lifts the eyes to a vast horizon spanning more than 2.4 million years.  Modern science reads the fossil record, revealing that human-beings have been around as a recognisable species for more than 2.4 million years.  If our human story were an encyclopedia of 2,400 pages then for 2,390 pages that connection of barefoot to earth, repeats itself billions of times over, shaping and adapting itself.  The silent footfall, the stealth of the stalker and the stalked merges into the same intense alert poised awake presence.  In the closing chapter of ten or so pages we became 'civilised'.  On the last paragraph we began to wear factory-produced shoes.  Somewhere in the final sentence comes the commercialisation of sport.

A modern foot, lured to perform by telephone-number sums of money hits the expensively man-made 'fast' track.  Crippled inside its equally expensive shoe, it is a  symbol of the Disconnection from the ancestral spirit and essence of the Running People. Hear the lonely, isolated voice of the Disconnect as it echoes through the words of the recently fastest man in the world, 'As far as I am concerned the man who said “It's not the winning that matters but the taking part” was a loser'.  Having said that this individual sinks into a mire of suspicion over performance drug abuse in a swamp that has sunk so many other talented athletes. Quite possibly more bad-faith has been generated in the last sentence of the human story than in the whole of the rest of the book of the story of the Running People.

Within living memory there are the greats who inspire with an authentic generosity and humility that comes from the spirit and essence of the Running People.  Herb Eliot and Roger Bannister, consistently refused huge lucrative sponsorship deals.  The great Emile Zatopet, cleaned lavatories until the end of his days under communist tyranny, refusing a huge £10,000 offer to coach in Finland. These are the true sportsmen who connect to the spirit and essence of the Running People – what the dead give to the as yet, unborn great athletes of the future.  Connecting to that  essence happens in the now.  The demand to be present, awake in this way is the 'line to be crossed' in the Natural Running teaching.

We may tread through a territory of freedom and plenty but if we move through that terrain in tight shoes then we can never be free.  Young athletes were recently put the question, 'If there were a performance enhancing drug that was wholly undetectable and that would guarantee a medal, but left you an osteoarthritic wreck by the age of 30, would you take it?'  When 97% said they would take such a drug they are wearing that metaphorically tight shoe!  The craving to crawl to the top of the pile at any cost, to 'run on hate' is a shackle blocking a connection to the essence and spirit at the heart of true sport.  If fancy expensive shoes have become the crack cocaine of the modern runner, then, rather than feed the craving, the way to freedom and potential may well be to simply to free oneself from the craving.  Crossing the line into the ancestral spirit of running always confronts such locks.  To free oneself in this way is a moment by moment challenge to transcend ego and habit.  An ego-driven commercialised culture presents many blocks and challenges to this process.  But many people now feel drawn to cross the line.

There are still cultures on the planet that have not developed  an ego-driven, market orientated culture.  Recently the Tarahumara Indian of New Mexico have appeared on the running stage.  They seem to embody and recognise that essence and spirit of running cannot be bought and sold as a commodity in the market place.  As the 25 years of development of the Natural Running Courses opens to become a website the hope is that it reaches out to support and most of all learn from such cultures and to bond and connect with individuals, who each in their own way, 'cross the line' and reconnect to the integrity and essence of the ancestral spirit of running.