At the beginning of the ChiRunning book one of my favorite concepts is introduced: “Your biography becomes your biology” [1]. We all have a biography that shapes our present moment, both physically and mentally. The good news is that “with a little patience and perseverance” we have the ability to add new choices and habits to our biography, providing far-reaching benefits to our health, fitness and well-being.

I was a very active kid and enjoyed a lot of different sports and activities. But as a teenager, running was one activity I did not enjoy. It was only a necessary means of

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Looking for a true gift, one to give or receive?  There may be no gift more valuable than a few simple ideas for lifelong health.

“The first wealth is health.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Most people are passionate about sharing ideas about healthy living. An important piece of the healthy living puzzle is fitness; also simply called ‘motion’. We are all designed for motion; our health depends on it. The challenge is getting moving and staying moving through repetitive motions that can sometimes result in

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Many of us have heard the concept of “running is a metaphor [or mirror] for life”.

There have been many ways to apply and learn from this concept.  Just Google the phrase and you will see many posts on the subject.

A few days ago a great quote came across my path:

“Tension is who you think you should be. Relaxation is who you are” ~ Chinese proverb

There is that ’should’ word again.  I think this quote finally describes the reason why

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The way we stand and move are habits formed over time from our life experiences. Making adjustments to your posture and motion will take time; but with consistent focus and practice, not nearly as much time in which those habits were formed.

In a previous post ‘A Journey of a Thousand Miles‘, the principle of Gradual Progress was introduced. This is a key principle for any change, not just your posture or your running/walking technique. It is a key principle of nature itself. Everything in nature transitions from state to state incrementally. When something in nature attempts to skip a step; and is inefficient or out of balance for too long, it is usually reminded of this principle with impact to its longevity.

Here is another way to look at it. If you had a choice, which set of steps below would you rather climb? Orange or Blue?

Perhaps most of us have never thought about it, but steps are designed specifically to allow humans to make Gradual Progress balancing effort with efficiency. Too little a step means too little effort and lower efficiency. Too big a step means too much effort and lower efficiency. Steps have a height (rise) and depth (run) based on their purpose.

If you have ever run or walked a hill and it felt much like a lot a additional effort, it could be that you were taking too big of a step. If you ever added too many upgrades (long, total miles, hills, intervals, etc) to your training program, you may have been asking your body to take too big a step forward.

When we take too big a ’step’, we can get out of balance. When we get out of balance, all kinds of compensations take over for the primary goal of survival (or the survival of the goal). We use more ‘muscle’, or other muscles not designed to handle the task; and maybe we sacrifice the long term to support the short term. Out of balance for too long, say in the repetitive stress motions of life, we can create resistance in the form of tension, fatigue, discomfort, aches/pains and eventually injury and/or dis-ease.

The question again comes back to “On average, what kind of steps are you taking as you move through the many aspects of your life?” … both physically and mentally. Are they steps balancing effort and efficiency, maximizing forward momentum and minimizing resistance or  are they steps which skip steps and/or pull you out of balance?

I experienced the negative effects of this concept a few years ago through my running. At one point, I struggled to run consistently due to nagging injuries for almost two years. That was almost four years ago and I have been running injury-free ever since. What changed? I did. I was introduced to ChiRunning and realized that both my running technique and my running program was out of balance. Both were asking my body to move in a state of in-balance and against simple principles of nature.

As I changed my approach to my running(*) through ChiRunning for effortless, injury-free running, I never expected its simple principles of nature to also teach me so much about the rest of life in nature. At first I thought this the bonus, but now realize it was clearly the prize.

[* and later my walking through ChiWalking so I can apply the principles all day long.]

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David Stretanski is a holistic health, fitness and wellness coach and Certified ChiRunning®/ChiWalking® Instructor. For more information on David, please see his About Me, Contact page or his website at http://www.eChiFitness.com.

ChiRunning® and ChiWalking® are registered trademarks of ChiLiving, Inc.

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Recently there has been a lot of focus on the concept of running barefoot.  Some purists suggest we should all be running barefoot, period.  Personally, I don’t care for the word ’should’.  It implies someone else telling me what to do or be, when we all have to decide that for ourselves.

But can we just go run barefoot?  To help answer this, consider how long it has been since you ran barefoot.  20 years, 40 years, 60 years?; most of us have not run barefoot since

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As with most ancient teachings, a simple principle applies to all aspects of our lives.  This one has been coming up a lot lately in a number of ways:

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. – Lao Tzu

And I am sure we have all heard that “it’s the journey, not the destination”.  So we might consider that the quality of our journey has more to do with the quality of each step than on where we end up.  A personal development mentor of mine, Jim Rohn, suggests that “wherever you are … be there.”  Simple, yet powerful idea to be present and fully experience each moment.

I think I first consciously learned this concept when I was a senior in college.  I was skiing with a bunch of friends on a cloudy, damp day and we came to the top of the steepest mogul field in New England; Outer Limits at Killington, VT.  Standing at the top I questioned the sanity of being there on this day as I looked into a dense fog.  You could not see much past a mogul or two; and certainly could not see the lodge about 1000′ down.  We all kind of looked at each other, shrugged as if to say here goes nothing, spread out and headed down the slope.  Immediately something seemed different but I could not put my finger on it.  After a few turns I started to hear yips and wahoos from my friends; and felt inclined to do the same.  We got to the bottom and all agreed that it was much easier than expected.  Over lunch it came to me … it was the fog that made it easier.  The fog forced us to be present, to focus on the next step, the next mogul and not on the many that followed, how steep the slope was or how long it was.  We simply focused on each step.

Lately through some big challenges this same concept keeps coming up, particularly when I am working on my running technique and preparing for and participating in ultramarathons.  What is more interesting is how what I learn “through” my running appears as lessons applicable to other areas of my life.  In ChiRunning and ChiWalking, the related principle of nature is simply called ‘Gradual Progress’.  The principle states that everything has to grow incrementally through it own developmental stages, from less to more or from smaller to larger.  When this process happens gradually, each step forms a stable foundation for the next step.  This insures that nothing happens before its time and teaches us to be more process [journey] oriented instead of goal [destination] orientated. A simple principle that can make a significant impact to the way we approach life.

So if we want to go from A to B, in any aspect of our life, we have to take the next step mentally and/or physically.  The question is what kind of step is it?  Is it a manage-able balanced step that creates incremental progress and momentum <or> is it an overextended step which results in inefficiency and resistance to our forward progress?

Of course, when going from A to B both a strong ‘why?’ will keep us motivated and a map will keep us efficiently in the intended direction.  But consider this – if we were to take a road trip, what percentage of that time is focused on the road vs. looking at the map?

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David Stretanski is a holistic health, fitness and wellness coach and Certified ChiRunning®/ChiWalking® Instructor. For more information on David, please see his About Me, Contact page or his website at http://www.eChiFitness.com.

ChiRunning® and ChiWalking® are registered trademarks of ChiLiving, Inc.

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Many health benefits are possible from mind/body practices such as Yoga, T’ai Chi and Qigong.  These benefits are the result of alignment, relaxation, flexibility, balance, breath, mindful movement and increased energy flow.  These Eastern practices promote a healthy balance between stimulus and stillness, both physically and mentally.  In the West, lifestyle choices often challenge this state of balance.  We go from place to place and task to task continuously; often overextended and disconnected between our body and mind.

What if it is possible to practice eastern principles in balance within our western world of (over) stimulation; and at the same time create a

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We are all creatures of motion, and the quality and quantity of our mobility directly affects the quality and quantity of our longevity.  Quality mobility might be defined as safe, effective, consistent and … enjoyable.

In a previous post “Natural Running Technique?, the question of running technique was discussed via the following two options:

1.  Run [or walk] the way you run ‘naturally’ [or subconsciously], and don’t mess with your technique.
2.  Consider [posture and] technique; usually based on the body’s design, simple principles of nature and laws of physics for the purpose of energy efficiency and injury-prevention.

As noted in the previous post, we really need to define the term ‘naturally’ to fully

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Bone Health is becoming a key health concern due to the statistics related to Osteoporosis and other bone health conditions.  Based on a lot of on-going research on this issue for my work as a fitness coach and wellness consultant, below are a few points that I thought all might want to know about Bone Health.

Our bones are responsible for much more than just our physical structure.  They are also a ‘bank’ of mineral reserves which the body uses for many metabolic processes; and are also a factory for our red and white blood cells.

Just like any other ‘bank’, there are deposits and withdrawals.  Deposits are when we

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A recent online webinar summarized a few key elements of nature we need to survive.  The presented list was:
- Oxygen
- Water
- Food (Nutrition)
- Sleep

These elements of nature are certainly critical to survival … but many of us are actively working towards more than settling for mere survival; we are looking to have abundant energy and health to thrive.  In support of this goal, we might want to clarify the above a bit more and perhaps add a few more

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