TOTAL RUNNING: All About the Mental and Spiritual Side

More about what happens in your head after you've got the Adidas on your feet. According to Lilliefors, we're running more and enjoying it less, we haw trouble sticking to our work-out schedules, we don't realize how running can enrich our lives. The main problem: we're not relaxed about running. Total Running, he counsels, ""is a progression which you begin when you go out and practice running with no goals."" To relax and be goal-less, we should think positive thoughts, which ""can eventually become habitual and we can learn to avoid depression for good."" The precise relation of all this to running remains unclear. But never mind--Lilliefors then decides that the value of running lies in its specific goals; with its repeated workouts and distances, ""running is a massive frightening battle."" To arm us, he trundles out the Southern California cosmicconsciousness omnibus. Yoga, Zen, rolfing, massage, biofeedback, TM--they're all here in half-baked explanations, but Lilliefors never does show how their practice can make of running an ""experience of self-awareness and heightened perception."" To anyone who runs this will be a bad case of shin splints.