Eleven wonderful GoodGym Barnet members joined us on Tuesday evening for our first group run to Long Lane Pasture this year — and what a lovely return it was.

With longer evenings and kinder weather finally on our side, most of us gathered at the Phoenix Cinema for a warm-up involving kickbacks, knee-ups and a few brisk movements to get the heart rate up before the 1.5-mile run to the nature reserve.

After numbering up, we had a quick chat about famous relatives, unusual jobs and curious family histories. Among the ancestral highlights were general’s, repossession agents, wedding dress designers and several other unexpected occupations. Clearly, GoodGym Barnet has a rich and slightly suspicious gene pool.

Then we headed off, with George kindly back-marking, keeping everyone together as we made our way towards Long Lane Pasture. En route, we paused under the bridge for a group photo — naturally taken with everyone in a squat position, because why simply stand around when you can turn it into a thigh workout?

At the pasture we were welcomed by Donald, and the place looked absolutely magnificent: lush, green, peaceful and full of evening birdsong. We quickly got to work collecting woodchip and loading it into rubble bags, while others helped with litter picking and pruning to keep the paths clear and welcoming.

It really is a beautiful green space. As the sun began to set, we noticed several species of birds singing away, clearly approving of our efforts or possibly telling us to hurry up and leave them in peace.

Before heading back, we finished with a short moment of forest bathing, slowing everything down with some gentle breathing and arm movements. After the running, woodchip hauling, pruning and squatting, it was a lovely way to pause and properly take in the place we had come to help.

Then it was back to the Phoenix Cinema, with a few exercises on the return route to keep everyone together and gently remind our legs that the evening wasn’t quite over yet.

A big thank you to everyone who came along to run, laugh, help out and support this lovely local green space. Long Lane Pasture is looking wonderful — and we were very happy to chip in.

A few people came online to do yoga and supportive GoodGym and Stephens House and Gardens.

yoga talk

The Mountain Practice

You do not build a mountain by commanding it to rise.

You return to it morning after morning, with breath in the ribs, weight in the heels, weather moving through you.

A slow lifting. A quiet holding. The spine learning stone, the shoulders learning sky, the heart learning not to run downhill with every sudden rain.

There is always wind.

It comes from old valleys, from names half-buried, from voices still circling long after the door has closed.

It moves across the face of things, pulling at loose ground, testing the roots, finding the cracks where water once entered and froze.

And some days the mountain is not mountain.

It is gravel. It is mud. It is a slope that has forgotten how to stay.

So you pause.

Not because the storm is over, but because there is a break inside the storm.

A clearing between gusts. A gap between thoughts. A breath before the next weather decides what it wants from you.

There, in that brief stillness, you place one stone back upon another.

Not perfectly. Not forever. Just enough to stand again.

This is the work.

The hamstring lengthens, the mind unclenches. The hip opens, the old fear loosens. The foot presses down, the mountain remembers it was never made to chase the clouds.

You learn that strength is not hardness.

The strongest rock has listened to rain for centuries.

The tallest ridge has been shaped by what tried to wear it away.

So you breathe into the places that want to collapse.

You soften without falling.

You hold without gripping.

You bend without becoming the wind.

And slowly, through the small returns, through the ordinary rituals, through hands to earth and eyes to horizon, something gathers.

A steadiness not born from control, but from practice.

A height not built in a day, but remembered one breath at a time.

Then others may come.

They may shelter in your lee, rest against your side, warm themselves where the sun has found you.

But you do not become mountain by carrying every traveller.

You do not become strong by letting every storm name you.

You stand best when your ground is your own.

And when the wind rises again — as it will — you do not ask to be untouched.

You ask only for the pause.

The break in the weather. The space before reaction. The breath before the body moves. The moment when the mountain, the mind, the muscle, and the heart all choose to remain.