”Shouldn’t you rest and relax a bit?”, ”Now that have time off, must you run?”
These are the kind of questions my friends sometimes ask me. However, for me running is resting and relaxing. It is difficult to explain and I can see why many people think of it as a paradox. I run, I sweat, my heart beat goes up – how can that be relaxing? Well, this is what this blog post will try to explain.

The autumn in Sweden is exceptionally warm and beautiful this year. In the morning on my way to work, I run by the lake, being a witness to the change of colors. From week to week, the colors of the leaves change and as I run and feel present in the Now, I observe these changes which makes me feel alive – that is meditation and a great way to rest my mind.

The physical exercise that I do in the morning makes my body calm and in harmony for the rest of the day. So physical exercise has nothing to do with stress, no, quite the opposite.

Often when people go on vacation they say: “now I’ll be on vacation, so physical exercise will have to wait” or “I won’t be able to start exercising now during vacations”. Well, I say this: “now when I’ll be on vacation, I will have more time to run” and I advise my friends: “now when you’re on vacation, this is a god opportunity to start exercising”.

After a busy day at work – sometimes with challenging tasks – the best rest I can give my body and my brain is a nice run or an hour at the gym. Then I can sleep well, my body has got what it is made for – exercise – and during the night, all the benefits of running makes my body stronger by natural recovery.

Stress makes your body tense. If you worry about something, then neither your brain nor your body can relax. Of course, I have problems and repetitive thoughts too but I believe that the tension in my body is reduced by all the physical training that I do.

When I have a headache (which is rare), I rarely take medicine if I can avoid it but I will definitely not cancel my run because of that. It often disappears naturally when I run. For women with PMS and/or a lot of pain during menstruation – don’t go to bed – go on a run (or a walk or a gym class)!

My experience is that all kinds of pain in the body that are caused by stress, fear, anxiousness etc. – all these conditions will only get better with physical exercise! Maybe you won’t “heal” completely or be free from your pain but I can guarantee that you will feel better (on the assumption that you don’t have a disease, of course). Some doctors actually prescribe physical exercise instead of pills. I wish more would do so.