Mindful Athlete Course 2020 | Podcast on Podbay

Mindful Athlete Course 2020

District Vision

This time of social distancing offers a unique opportunity to experience silence and to investigate the inner dimensions of running in solitude. All of the major marathons have been postponed and many of us are scrambling to maintain our training routines without the support of our team or training mates. The 2020 edition of the Mindful Athlete Course, based on five years of research and development with world class runners and meditation experts, is designed to help you explore the dynamic between silent and moving meditation. We're introducing eight mindfulness themes (breath, sounds, emotions...) that are being taught as seated and running sessions respectively. It’s a unique format aimed at helping you establish a more examined approach to running and life in general. The goal of this course is not to make you run faster or become a better meditator. There is another game to play here and it's about exploring the nature of the mind in all of its depth and complexity. Let's bring these new learnings to our physical training and become wiser and more compassionate in the process. During these exceptionally challenging times, our mission is to make mindfulness as accessible as possible to support everyone's mental wellbeing. You can listen to the 16 sessions of the course through this RSS link on your preferred podcast player or on SoundCloud.

#8 Movement: Would You Like To Dance?

Let's see if we can approach our training more like an elegant dance and less like a struggle. As one of the classic analogies points out: pain is inevitable, struggle is optional.

Mar 18, 2020

38 min

#8 Seated: Would You Like To Dance?

True mindfulness practice can feel like a mental dance, between moments of stable concentration and open-hearted, non-judgmental awareness of everything around us.

Mar 18, 2020

12 min

#7 Movement: What Is Happening?

So much is happening to us while we run if we only learn to pay attention. Can you hear the birds sing? Can you be aware of your physical and mental state without judgement?

Mar 18, 2020

39 min

#7 Seated: What Is Happening?

We're now ready to open up our awareness fully, to everything going on within and around us. This is sometimes considered more advanced but it's really the most effective way to start integrating mindfulness into everyday life.

Mar 18, 2020

13 min

#6 Movement: Why Do You Train?

As we begin to move, our natural tendencies in training become more evident. Why are we doing this to ourselves? How can we get less carried away by our constant mood swings and take our practice forward?

Mar 18, 2020

35 min

#6 Seated: Why Do You Train?

Let's turn our attention to what motivates us to work out in the first place. Meditation is a form of mental training that can help us illuminate some of the underlying challenges and opportunities in our physical training.

Mar 18, 2020

13 min

#5 Movement: What Is a Thought?

Our mind generally appears a lot more distracted when we're in motion. Becoming mindful of thoughts here can be challenging and even brief moments of awareness can bring a lot of clarity in your workout.

Mar 18, 2020

36 min

#5 Seated: What Is a Thought?

Thoughts and other mental events are considered another foundation of mindfulness. We will now attempt to witness them as they appear, while sitting silently.

Mar 18, 2020

9 min

#4 Movement: How Do You Feel?

We all know that our emotional state during a workout can be volatile, to say the least. We'll now attempt to bring some awareness to the way gentle motion affects our mood.

Mar 18, 2020

37 min

#4 Seated: How Do You Feel?

We're now getting into the more subtle realm of consciousness, by learning to be mindful of our emotions. This is another one of the traditional foundations of mindfulness.

Mar 18, 2020

8 min