Christopher McDougall Quotes

I've run 350 days a year for 20-plus years, and never once have I listened to music. It's a time for me to think, listen to natural sounds, be outside.

Running is something you can do and be alone in your thoughts, and I like that. Maybe I've been a runner my whole life.

Nothing clears my head and puts things in perspective quite like a long, hard run.

Running is how I clear my head and find my center again.

A lot of times, some of my best ideas happen when I'm running. That's when I do my best thinking.

But if you can find that spot - I suppose it's like running - I used to be a swimmer and swim laps, and you just have to be there with what you're doing.

One thing I love to do when I'm working out is take my watch off, take my heart strap off, and just run - not for time, not for exertion, but just to get the blood flowing.

My favorite part of running is the thinking time.

The reason I really started running was for meditative purposes. I would pick some problem to have in my head while running.

Running is a great way to relieve stress and clear the mind.

One of the things I've always enjoyed is moving around and staying fit. Physicality is such a big part of being an actor, but it's also about stillness and silence.

Running is a simple, primitive act, and therein lays its power. For it is one of the few commonalities left between us as a human race.

I guess I started running when I was about 18 and... I feel like it assists my creativity a bit because it completely just flushes everything out.

I do find walking is fundamental to my creative process.

Walking is magic. Can't recommend it highly enough. I read that Plato and Aristotle did much of their brilliant thinking together while ambulating. The movement, the meditation, the health of the blood pumping, and the rhythm of footsteps... this is a primal way to connect with one's deeper self.

Going for a really long run, a bike ride, or cross-country skiing helps me get away from all the noise. I tell myself, 'The pain you're feeling, just enjoy it because it's going to help you across that finish line first.' If you're having a crap day, go for a run. It makes a big difference.

The great thing about running is that you can get away to your own thoughts and get in a little bubble.

Running is my meditation.

I don't listen to music when I run; I like the quiet. It gives me time to think about my family, our businesses, the farm - there's not much I don't think about, to be honest.

One man has discovered that by running there is no need to meditate, just by running meditation happens. He must be absolutely body oriented. Nobody has ever thought that by running meditation is possible - but I know, I used to love running myself. It happens. If you go on running, if you run fast, thinking stops, because thinking cannot possibly continue when you are running very fast. For thinking an easy chair is needed, that's why we call thinkers armchair philosophers; they sit and relax in a chair, the body completely relaxed, then the whole energy moves into the mind.

If you don't have answers to your problems after a four-hour run, you ain't getting them.

Prayer and contemplation are both exercises in concentration. The normal deluge of conscious thought is restricted and the mind is brought to one conscious area of operation. The results are those you find in any concentrative practice: deep calm, a physiological slowing of the metabolism and a sense of peace and wellbeing

I enjoyed the discipline and solitariness of long-distance running, which allowed me to escape from the hurly-burly of school life.

Build your inner environment. Practice Silence! I remember the wonderful discipline of the Great Ones. When we used to talk and chatter, they would say: "Go back into your inner castle." It was very hard to comprehend then, but now I understand the way of peace

I've been doing a lot of yoga to help with my running, recovery, and mental clarity. It works great for me.