Labyrinths and meditations

1. Set up the spiral run beforehand, make two or three of them, large, with the ability to run wide loops at the outside and a tight loops near the center.

2. We're going to start by sitting and doing a fairly short meditation. Sit, and start to pay attention to your breathing. Nearly all meditation seems to be about that, fundamentally, attention to your breathing. Just breathe and think about your breathing, when a random thought comes into your mind, note it and put a little flag into it, don't blame yourself or feel guilty, just put a flag into it and come back to your breathing. Take a minute or two to just do this. 

3. The next step is a body scan. Begin at the top of your head. Bring your attention to the tippy top of your skull, the highest point that your body holds. Take a second to get your attention there to the top of your head. Take a second there, then be ready to move down. Everyone ready? Ok, now slowly, and still paying attention to your breath, walk your attention down. From the top of your head, down in circles and spirals, to your forehead, to an ear and the back of your head to the other ear, then past your mouth, then slowly, down, looping your attention down your body, eventually coming to your toes, and then back up. This whole process should take about two minutes.

4. Now we run the labyrinth. Before we run, I want to give you these instructions on your attention as you run: notice your steps and breathing, the interacting rhythms of them. Two steps per breath, three, four?  Do your steps change according to how fast you are running or where you are running? Do changes in the terrain cause changes in your steps? Notice all of this, pay close attention to it. Is the rhythm of your breathing and your steps and your pace affected by where you are running? By terrain changes, by people around you? As you run, do versions of the body scan I just trained you in. So, run, do the spiral once, d it once, (the logistics of how to manage several runners so that they don't bump into each other might be funny) then around the woodland trails of the peninsula, then around the spiral again. 

5. Return, and get ready for a longer meditation. Most meditations start with centering yourself in the world notice where you are and the world around you, what sounds and smells there are, what sounds are coming from people and airplanes and yelling children and birds and the falling leaves and the sounds of the park, and the ground beneath you and what it is like to feel. Meditations start with an awareness of your environment, a placing of yourself in this place. P

6. . The normal body scan, and then in to heart center and out, 

As you breathe in, visualize all of the energy in your body shrinking into your heart, condensing into you like a collapsing galaxy, and when you breathe out, visualize that galaxy expanding, all of your energy radiating out from your heart out into your body to your fingers and toes and nose. In, the energy condenses to your heart; out, the energy flows outward. In smaller to the heart, out larger through the body. You’re not  thinking about anything except for your breathing and the in and out flow of energy. If a thought comes in, let it come, note it, and then come back to your breathing, which is flowing in smaller, out larger. In to the heart, out through the body… always paying attention to the breath.

7. Then a freedom, let your mind do whatever it wants to do, if it wants to stay focused on the breath than that's what it should do, if it wants to wander, then that's what it should do.

8. Then the imaginary running adventure. Start here, then go somewhere, tell a story...

Start here, where you are, keeping your eyes closed, and not actually moving, stand up. Don't stand up in the world, but in your mind. With your eyes still closed and sitting down still, very slowly, start jogging around the spiral in front of you, very slowly, just a lazy trot. Notice how your breathing pace and your running pace interact, how many steps per breath. Now run outside of the spiral, out into the woodlands of the peninsula, go a little faster and focus on the interaction of your breathing and steps, how the rhythm of your breath and the rhythms of your steps overlap and interact with each other, now go a little faster and continue to adjust and notice the interactions between your breathing, if it’s three steps per inhale, to four steps on an exhale, to five on an inhale. Go around the woodland trail noticing this. 

Now you're back to here, and you can run wherever you want. Gravity doesn't apply, nor distance, no more or less than you want it to. Take a running adventure. I'm going to give everyone about five minutes, and I'm not going to talk or give anymore guidance, but go and run wherever you want to. It doesn't have to be in prospect park, or brooklyn, or now, or earth, or anthing possible. Just see where your steps and your breathing take you. 

Now we are going to do a running visualization. I’m not going to give many instructions, but I want you to run adventurously, through different terrain (up and down hills, through forests, through cities), at different paces (slowly for a long time, then quick and hard sprints, then walking, long and short strides and turns and weaving and straightaways.

( turning and going straight visualize running, visualize going up a tall hill, through a field, down the street, going faster and slower, sprinting with your legs in long strides, slowing down into the tiniest gait, then just walking, enjoying a simple walk, then running, up and down, across, through, slow, fast, sprinting.)

I’m going to be silent for a while, and let you embark on a running journey, but mix it up, try out lots of different ways of running in your mind, make it a rich and strange adventure. 

Ok, let’s open our eyes. Let's share our running adventures. (And it could transition into a surrealist game... need to work on logistics for this one.