If you run, meditate, practice yoga or just love fitness, you should absolutely read this book.I’ve always viewed my running practice as a moving meditation and wondered how the two disciplines converged. When I saw this book, I thought it could answer the many questions I’ve always had about the connection between running and meditation.Running with the Mind of Meditation is a wonderful read about two very synergistic practices. Sakyong Mipham is a Tibetan lama and leader of Shambhala, a community of over a hundred meditation retreat centers worldwide, and a serious runner, with nine marathons under his belt. He has run in the toughest of climates and the harshest of terrain (for example, running with little sleep in the Indian wilderness at 3:30 a.m. on one trip, and in knee-high snow in post-blizzard, frigid North American terrain, complete with moose and bald eagles, in another.) Saying Mipham is a devotee to both practices would be an understatement.His voice on the page is calm and meditative itself. His writing style is clear and clean, but also effervescent, brimming with energy and inquisitiveness. There is not a word wasted, or spared. The reader welcomes just another page before shutting the book. It's hard to put down.He instructs the reader on how to meditate and run properly. The body benefits from movement, the mind from stillness, so together the two practices make up an ideal mind-body practice. In meditation, he introduces us to the stages of strengthening and developing the mind. Long periods of overstimulation can affect our organs and blood flow. As for running, he says it is pivotal to be mindful, wholly present, to bring an attitude of respect, full-heartedness and appreciation to your practice. He applies tools from his meditation practice to running, but ultimately sees the two as separate activities.Still, he does discuss how the two converge. In what he calls a “dragon run,” for instance, you can run with a deep purpose and connect to an important theme that has come to the surface of your life. The run becomes a meditation as you focus on a chosen thought. For example, if you want to make a change in your life, running and contemplating that change may help you visualize and realize it. Moving the body, and bringing up an important though to contemplate, can be highly compatible activities.One thing that I did feel was lacking was any kind of explanation as to what happens to the brain during both practices, and if a similar reaction or experience is taking place (for instance, the appearance of theta waves in the brain that tend to appear during meditation or regions of the brain that are activated). This would have evidenced the link between the two practices. Personal experience is fulfilling, but since this is not a memoir but an informative book on the topic, some research or discussion of it would have been helpful.Still, for lovers of running, meditation, spirituality, sports, I'd add it to your shelf.