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Cycling and Meditation
Last year I wrote often about biking, running and swimming because I was training for a triathlon (which I completed!) but this year, without that goal, I’ve been a bit lax about working out. Yes, even nuns workout. I come from an athletic background having biked a lot and played team sports and just been an outdoorsy kind of gal. So with all that said, it felt GREAT to get on my road bike this morning and crank out some miles commuting to work. My good friend Carol and I are going for a 20+ mile ride after work. I used this great web site … Map My Ride … to map the ride so that we can get a good 20 miles in. i also used the Chicago Bike Map to find the safest streets and trails to ride on. The ride takes us through city streets, neighborhoods, parks, forest preserves and along the Chicago River. What fun! (And also very economical because I don’t have to go to the gas pump!)
One thing that I love about cycling is that it is very meditative for me (unless in major traffic). There’s a wonderful rhythm of breathing and repetition and being in sync with oneself and the bike — for me it is conducive for meditation. When I am done cycling, I’m tired, but I also feel very centered and can easily slip into prayer.
What practice helps you to slip into prayer?
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Cycling.
Hiking.
Yoga.
Gardening.
Walking.
Cooking, if I’ve got time to do it and it’s something I love and I do it with a heart full of thankfulness for the good things we can have.
As long as one does them deliberately, I think most activities have a certain meditative character. I once read that knitting makes your brain behave the way deep meditation has…plus you have socks or gloves afterwards as a bonus.
Unlike chanting the Divine Mercy chaplet, I have to say that it’s hard for me to say the Rosary if I’m not moving, whether walking or driving.
I agree that when driving, if the traffic is hectic, it’s hard to meditate on the mysteries of the Rosary, but I’ve adapted my route to accommodate my time with Jesus and His mother.
Koko — yes, there is that thing about being deliberate, being present to that moment. For me, doing something like that occupies a part of my brain that might (read: will) ordinarily get distracted. It’s also a way to bring one’s whole self into the prayer — body, mind and Spirit.
Hi Augustine — I’m like that too with the Rosary. It was a prayer that I never really could get into until I started moving with it — but not too good when bike riding. Bike riding calls for either silence or 1-phrase/1-sentence prayers. It’s cool to be able to spend time with Jesus, Mary and the saints that way.
Swimming laps.
Journaling.
Collaging.
Taking a walk in the woods.
Julie, if you can, try to get ahold of a copy of “Inner Marathon
” by Sr. Joan Sauro, CSJ–it is out of print but available online. Joan was/is a runner, and writes about how her running enhanced her prayer and is a form of meditation. She’s also a wonderful artist and poet.
See you TOMORROW–hooray! Peggy
Thank God, I am not crazy. I am a regular bike commuter. My current work route is in too much traffic to afford formal prayer- a lot of instantaneous prayer, but not formal prayer.
My former route (different job) afforded me about 20 minutes of protected, straight, flat, traffic-less trail riding along a river, and I usually spent that time repeating short prayers from memory. I thought I was alone in doing that!
The repetitive cadence of the bike was in rhythm with the stances and I often “lost myself in prayer” much easier than in my regular formal daily prayer and meditation practices.
When “in the groove” with prayer- whether on a bike or not- it is great feeling. The words seem to take on deeper meaning than other words, and are virtually tangible. You don’t dwell on them- everything flows smoothly- but they are particularly meaningful and they seem to permeate your entire body- not just your brain.
I wish this were my daily experience with prayer, but it has not been for me. It is very weird how easy prayer and meditation sometime come, and how forced they are at other times. I have reflected upon it often and can’t find a cause and effect. Sometimes prayer is “easy” when life is going well, I am rested, not anxious, etc. Sometimes it is the opposite.
Lest you think I am a bike acrobat, the “stances” referred to in my previous post, should have read “stanzas.”
LOL and wishing all my fellow “Holy Rollers” safe rolling …
_ —
/—I—-I\
( ) ( )
Jacqueline — Swimming laps!! You reminded me of the sheer joy of swimming a 1/2 mile lap in Lake Michigan along the shore of downtown Chicago. Some days it was near to a mystical experience — gazing out into the vastness of the lake, the cool water, the sparkling sun — oh, yes, and the occasional snorts of water which weren’t so mystical!
Peggy — Can’t wait to see you and Maxine too! It’ll be great! I immediately went to Amazon and ordered Inner Marathon
for a handful of change. Thanks for the suggestion. 
David — I laughed out loud reading “too much traffic to afford formal prayer- a lot of instantaneous prayer, but not formal prayer” — that is so true! Traffic does afford its own type of prayer!
Your reflection on prayer is beautiful. Let me sit with it a bit more and perhaps write this morning’s post on it.
I find I can pray when I fold clothes. I have two kids and work full time, so there are usually clothes to fold and I usually let them accumulate to a fairly big pile. Then when I have time to fold them, I try to focus on my breathing and keep a short prayer in mind as I move through the pile. I also find that as I pick up individual items, it makes me think about the person who work them – my daughter’s soccer socks, my husband’s work jeans. I once read a short book by Kathleen Norris on the spirituality in daily housework, and I find it’s true, although I don’t keep a clean enough house to really get much prayer benefit from other chores.
Thanks very much for your blog, Sr Julie. I really enjoy it.
Amy
What practice helps you to slip into prayer?
Swimming laps, running, and walking all easily pull me into prayer. Swimming especially; perhaps it’s water’s buoyancy and symbolic weight that make it so? Other quotidian tasks, like laundry, are also prayerful moments, ranging from “Lord, thank you for all you have given us” to “Lord, please help me learn to love the stains as much as the one who built them.”
Preparing meals is also a time of prayer, but without any humility whatsoever. At some point I realized I always visualize the faces from my childhood Book of Martyrs when I’m chopping, peeling and slicing. My family says I may have spent too much time with that book.
Kokopelli25 said: “I once read that knitting makes your brain behave the way deep meditation does…”.
Today when my dad returned home to collect my mom’s knitting before returning to the hospital, he said, “She can’t be anywhere without it, or so it seems.” I asked if maybe her knitting was akin to a teddy bear: familiar, safe, beloved. Little did I know then it may be so much more. Thanks, Kokopelli25, for this insight.
I find I’m often pulled into prayer while swimming, running, or walking. Something about the rhythm and flow of physical exertion seems to parallel the rhythm and flow of prayer.
Thank you for Map My Ride. For runners and walkers there is also gmap-pedometer.com which has equivalent functionality. Many thanks also for the mention of “Inner Marathon
” by Sr. Joan Sauro which I’ll pass along to my running group.