Why Running is So Important Now

If you're afraid, worried, or sad, try some vigorous exercise.

Life is very stressful these days, even if you’re grateful and hopeful.

Looking to find some sanity and serenity in all the turmoil?

Go for a to.

No, that wasn’t a typo.

Let me explain.

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From Here to There

You see, I’m blessed to teach The Healthy Jew class every evening to a lively group of gap-year guys who chose to spend their year studying Torah at Yeshivas Lev Hatorah of Ramat Beit Shemesh, Israel.

We learn and practice healthy Jewish living. We also enjoy lots of night walks through Natural Israel.

We talk the insider language of Healthy Jews:

Good sleep is Be Well.

Is that Real Food?

What a Walker!

We’re building a new dialect for Healthy Jews, although there’s nothing really novel about Healthy Jewish.

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The following four words seem to touch everything we’re doing:

From here to there.

Veteran readers of The Healthy Jew might remember that from several months ago:

From Here to There

Or maybe you recall the follow-up post:

Maps and Apps

The basic idea is that health, happiness, and wholeness begin with knowing a destination that’s beyond where and who we are right now. Something and Someone lies ahead, beckoning for us to join.

Where is this destination?

There.

But today we’re not there, because there is past what we’ve already reached. So where are we?

Here.

Living well means going from here to there, being the process of moving and growing beyond our current selves.

It’s that simple: everything else in life and Judaism is the details. (A great place to begin the details is in those two articles.)

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Let’s Go for a To

One of the Healthy Jews at Lev Hatorah recently coined a new term: to. As a verb, it’s called to-ing. The person who does it is called a to-er.

I think that was an important discovery.

From here gets the attention it deserves: after all, it’s our entire world. There also gets noticed: it’s the purpose of everything.

But what about the to? The movement itself - that process that takes us from here to there - can get lost in the shuffle.

Brisk walking, as I’ve written before, is the elementary to. For many folks, that’s all the movement that’s necessary to live happy and healthy.

The Wonders of Walking

Yet many of us need something more to get us fully focused on the to. Even while walking, we can get distracted by the from here with watching the scenery and thinking about everything we’re going to do after we finish walking.

To become to-ers, we’ll build a practice of vigorous exercise in which we regularly set time to push past all the looking and thinking, fully immersing ourselves in the process of going from here to there. We become the movement.

There are many ways of to-ing: weights, swimming, jumprope, mountain climbing.

But the classic to is undoubtedly running, because running is walking that’s intensified to become a full to experience.

Once we get inside running, we become the run. Our surroundings dim, the thinking quiets. All that exists is the next step and breath, the path in front.

Trail running is particularly powerful: the mind needs to focus on each step, lest the to-ing come to an abrupt end after tripping on a hidden root or slipping on a rock.

Hiking with the Healthy Jews of Lev Hatorah yesterday morning, in the mountains outside of Eilat. Steep trails aren’t the right place to run - but climbing itself is great vigorous exercise.

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So if you’re feeling tense, afraid, or angry, go for a to. A good run - or, if running doesn’t work for you, another form of vigorous exercise - works wonders for your mind and heart by breaking out of the pain of here and worries about there, transforming into the process of to.

I’m not only talking from personal experience. Numerous studies show the mental health benefits of regular vigorous exercise. It might even treat depression and anxiety equally well to meds, perhaps even by activating the same neural pathways. And all the side effects are positive: improved health in many areas of body, mind, and spirit.

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Although running is perhaps the simplest form of vigorous exercise, there are some simple rules for how to do it right.

• If you’re not yet an experienced runner, build up slowly, and don’t run two consecutive days.

• If you feel a cramp in your legs, back, or chest, stop right away. Don’t run again until it gets better. Learn your body.

• Run lightly, with a joyful bounce, not dragging your feet along the ground.

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There’s lots more to explain about running safely and efficiently. I’ll share more another time.