Creating The Space for Whatever is Next...
So - on the penultimate day of my 'training camp' in Gros Islet, I decided to read up on information and advice for running in high temperatures with high humidity...!
I hadn't realised that sweat is plasma from the blood and that high sweating affects total blood volume, I do know that a couple of weeks ago I started to feel 'wiped out' and so bought an iron tonic which picked me up within a couple of days...
I am also very much encouraged to find that the perceived wisdom is that humidity affects mile repetition times by up to 20 seconds! I like this kind of data...!
The guidance also suggested that when running, 'run to effort rather than time' - this is something I do naturally, and allow the 'fast times' to emerge from this place...
I particularly learnt this in the 80's when I ran in the mountains in Switzerland... Each weekend there was a race, and due to the fact they were straight up the side of a mountain, or sometimes on the road twisting its way up up up, the times were of course slow and the effort huge... Royally rewarded, it must be said with a joyous welcome at the top; music, clapping, trestle tables laden with sumptuous fare... And a little glass of schnapps handed to us as we crossed the line!
The training in between - unless carried out along the valley - was also up, so the pace was slow... Therefore instead of adding up miles each week, I would run to time, and go out for the same time of running rather than the same distance...
Today we trekked to the top of Pigeon Island for the last time. As we wandered through the verdant beauty of the park to the base of the steep rocky path, a tree called to me to climb into its branches; seeing little Arianna clamber up the sea grape tree this week had reignited in me the delight of 
scrambling up the trunk of a tree, the feel of the bark, the smell... Rediscovering the flexibility and ability in my body to clamber and jump... And ultimately do those cartwheels and hand stands I am still working on! - has been asking that I free up from old injures, and tensions within my body...
It is a daily practice, both to keep stretching and doing the conditioning exercises, but also to keep freeing up from any fear and 'holding back' and any outdated patterns of struggle and of 'expecting things to be difficult...'
Crab energy has run across my path almost daily, scuttling across the beach in front of my feet into its hole, reminding me with its animal totem energy, that there is an easier route...
As a child I can remember it being said of me that 'Julia always has to learn the hard way..!'
I reckon I am done with learning that way!
The two months here have seen shifts within me that are showing up in the balance and strength I am feeling in my running steps.
It is as if the 'top tumble' I took on the rocks, just a week after arriving here, shook me to the foundations of my being, juggling everything about inside me and revealing where I needed to release rather than settle back into old familiar - if unhelpful - patterns...
With nothing familiar around me, and Anadi and I alone to explore our processes without distraction, the old was able to leave and so create the space for whatever is to come next...
At the top of the island Anadi climbed even higher, up to the top of the flag mast - which isn't flying a flag at the moment...
He became the flag! Waving goodbye to Gros islet and pigeon island...
