I hate to jog. And I hate to meditate. So I decided to practice mindfulness meditation while jogging.
I started with a focus on sounds ( Attention Training Therapy ATT. I will discuss ATT in another blog. ) ATT is Open Focus with sounds.
As soon as I turned off the main traffic artery, I realized bird and maybe cricket sounds were all around. I have run the same route three times a week and never heard those sounds before.
Then I thought of the Open-Focus space-awareness exercise posted by Tomasz Kopec, M.D. I focused on the space between the atoms in my body. We mostly consist of space between atoms. And each atom is virtually just space.
Here is a short video clip from the PBS “A Science Odyssey.”
The reason we and all else appears solid is the electrons from one thing repel the electrons from another. But there is virtually nothing really there but space.
I recalled the image photographed by Voyager 1 from six billion kilos out from earth. The Voyager 1 was turned around to snap the image just before it left our solar system. In the image (known as Pale Blue Dot) earth is one pixel in the vast infinity of space.
I am an infinite speck of dust on a planet Carl Sagan referred to – I’m paraphrasing – as a spec of dust in a shaft of sunlight.
Click on the image to enlarge. Can you pick out the one-pixel dot that is our planet earth? It is right side, lower middle.
What a wonderful jog.
Have fun with meditation. Be loose and creative.
Self-help books that help:
Total Self-Renewal through Attention Therapies and Open Focus
The Open-Focus Brain: Harnessing the Power of Attention to Heal Mind and Body
