I have an author I’d love for you to meet today. His name is Paul M. Martin and I know he’ll leave a lasting impression on you. He has written a beautifully moving book, Original Faith, that details his own personal spiritual journey. It basically chronicles how Paul Martin found Paul Martin.
I am, literally, venturing off of the couch – out from under a mountain of Kleenex, hot green tea, and warm blankets to publish this particular post – I’m that excited for you to become familiar with this inspiring author. However, my mind is a little cloudy (a head full of nastiness will do that to a person) so I’ll save my own personal book review of Original Faith for Monday.
For now, I’ll allow Paul Martin, himself, to introduce himself and I’ll just step aside and try not to breath on anyone.
ABOUT PAUL M. MARTIN:
Paul M. Martin writes with exceptional clarity about spiritual matters. His depth and breadth of first-hand experience allows him to speak compellingly to people across a wide range of perspectives on religion and spirituality.
At age twenty-three, Paul had a spontaneous experience of the kind that is often sought through meditation and 
prayer. It was immensely hopeful. It stood in complete defiance of his despairing world view. It was the primary source material for the rest of his life and the genesis of Original Faith. Within a year, Paul visited the Trappist monastery in Spencer, Massachusetts, where he learned meditation from the late Fr. Basil Pennington. Within two years, he went on to receive an M.A. in religious studies from the University of Chicago. In the coming years, he would also earn a M. Ed. in counseling as his public school career transitioned from English as a Second Language teacher to elementary school counselor.
At age thirty-seven, with Original Faith perhaps two years from completion, Paul experienced the onset of a condition that would never be diagnosed. He was forced to set the manuscript aside for the better part of the next decade as he combined full-time work with extensive medical research and travel. By May 2002, Paul’s disability had become too severe for continued work outside the home, and he resumed work on Original Faith.
Between 2002 and 2006, he completed the book, along with two additional manuscripts, managing to convert his handwritten notes to Word documents before he lost the ability to walk and work with paper.
Find out more about Paul by visiting his website, www.originalfaith.com, and his blog, http://www.originalfaith.com/blog/index.html.
As part of the WOW Women on Writing blog tour, Self Help Daily is honored to have the opportunity to publish a guest post by Paul Martin.
Running as Spiritual Exercise
By Paul M. Martin
When I first started jogging, I only ran for the health benefits and really didn’t care much for the activity itself. But sometime during my second year, I began to make some changes that made it less of a grind. By the time they were all in effect, running had turned from drudgery to spiritual exercise.
Here’s what I learned:
How to Find the Spiritual Side of Running
Pick your best place: It’s worth a warm-up walk or even a short drive by bike or car if you
need that to get away from heavy traffic or find a place with some natural scenery.
Pick your best times: Exposing yourself to extreme weather conditions can be dangerous, especially in the long run. And depending on where you live, year-round running may be hazardous to your health – for example, if it forces you onto unsuitable roadsides.
Forget about speed and distance goals: Unless you’re a competitive athlete, once you’ve reached a comfortable run or jog that fits your schedule and helps keep you fit, forget about further speed or distance goals. Why?
Find your pace: Because this will let you find your own pace, your own rhythm of breathing and stride that represents your personal peak efficiency of movement. When you get that right, it will often feel effortless and like you could run forever.
Spiritual Outcomes
Anticipate…
Deep Relaxation: Running at your own pace, like meditation, has relaxing effects at the time you perform the activity. These eventually start to carry over into your day to day life.
Creativity: You’ll find yourself doing much of your best thinking literally on the run. Fresh, unanticipated ideas will unexpectedly pop into mind the way that you may have already experienced say, in the shower or on long drives – but more so.
Runner’s High: It comes with that physical and spiritual sense of ease and freedom that makes you feel like you could run forever. It includes a relaxed and elevated mood with sharpened sensory perceptions.
Spiritual Experiences: Expect to feel “one with the universe” now and then. Running saturates you with the outdoors. Your own perspiration seems to mingle with the mist in the air; the rhythms of your own body can feel like part of the rhythms of the larger world.
After a few years of this, I would have found it hard to stop running even if I’d learned that it was bad for my health! Taking steps to make your runs a joy is the key to stepping into the spiritual side of running.
Paul Maurice Martin is the author of Original Faith. Please visit his web site and blog to read more about the author and his spiritual journey. You can also order his beautiful and uplifting book on his web site.
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
It’s like the mind having a mind of its own when it’s running on another gear. My last jog was probably twenty years back when I was healthier but I comprehend what Paul is saying. I get this ‘high’ now when I play the piano. I seem to be able to solve other problems when playing and I think clearer too. So in this case, it’s my fingers doing the exercising!
I love your take on running, Paul, and how you connected with your own spirit and “Spirit.” I was never much of a runner but I have had a similar experience with fast walking. And it does bring the added benefit of clearing out clutter and boosting creativity! Hope you are enjoying the tour!
Running (and walking) is, to me, a perfect way to clear your head. It shakes out the cobwebs and restores clarity and “right thinking.” A lot of times when I’m trying to make a decision or figure out one of life’s peculiar little problems, I’ll throw my shoes on and take a walk, ride a bike, or even jog. I had always been a walker but my oldest and youngest daughters (Emily and Stephany) have gotten me hooked on jogging and biking. – Joi
Pauline – “It’s like the mind having a mind of its own when it’s running on another gear. ” Good way to put it!
Jan and Joi – I’ve noticed lots of people seem to get from walking what I got from jogging. I got my mom jogging when I was about 20 and she was about 50. Now she’s 82 and still jogs…
Paul, I love the fact that you got your mom into jogging! No doubt that has contributed to her long life – and to the fact that she’s still jogging.
That’s fantastic… I love it! – Joi
Hi Paul, thanks for sharing your story on how you found you. I can appreciate that testimony because I just recently embarked on my own journey to Felicia and what I’ve found and still finding is trully wonderful, beautiful and rare! I am not a runner though I used to be in my earlier days…About three years ago I started walking for the fitness benefits but now I do it for sheer joyof it
It does create a clearing for what the Universe is speaking to me personally and it gives me an opportunity to commune with nature. Peace and Love to Paul, continue on!
Feel better Joi
Felicia, Thanks – I feel much, much better now! Green Tea… gets you back on your feet and looking for trouble in record time! – Joi
Joi – That and she’s always had really good blood chemistry…
Felicia – The nature aspect was a big part of my running, too – I chose settings that were as rural-seeming as I could get! I should add that the book isn’t a memoir or autobiography. That would be really boring. Paul writes. Paul goes to work. Paul jogs. Repeat X hundred thousand times, lol…
Original Faith makes use of some stuff from my life but only where that helps to move the message along. One person who reviewed the book compared it to ” Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” in this respect – and that comparison had occurred to me as well, before he mentioned it.