I thought I’d share a bit about what I’ve been up to and what I’m aiming to do in the future.

I LOVE to walk. Most days I have been walking either alone or with my dog- choosing a pretty place to go, listening to a podcast or audiobook that I could only listen to when I was walking. It became my treat. In early 2018, I joined a couple web-based running (inclusive of walkers) communities and did some fun, hard competitions where all that mattered was that I move, no matter how slowly.

This past summer, I wanted to try running again. I had some periods where my body wasn’t having it and that was ok. I backed off and went back to walking.

I then did a modified C25k program where I repeated weeks and bumped up the running intervals very slowly and did NOT ever progress to the point of full out running. That doesn’t work for me at all - I get hurt too easily. I only ran 3 days per week, and found that I looked forward to those days. I gave myself permission to walk when needed. The goal was simply to be out there moving for a certain length of time, no matter how fast I was.

Somewhere along the line something clicked. I started to see progress in running for a small interval of time becoming easier and started to change my mindset, also tuning around unhelpful sources of information around needing to reach a certain speed or having to transform my body. Those are not motivating goals to me and they don’t help me, so I focus on getting out there, finding things that make running joyful (music, podcasts or audiobooks, taking photos, discovering new fun routes, feeling like my city is even more accessible when I can reach places by foot that I’d only driven to before.)

Several running friends/community members encouraged me to consider myself a runner even if I didn’t think I was due to my lack of skill/experience. I thought about it and decided to practice that mindset.

Okay, so I’m going to be a runner. What would a runner do? They would choose days to go out and run - okay, let’s try that. They might register for some fun events. They would take care of their body to prevent or recover from strains and injuries.

I found that running with this mindset helped me develop some discipline that was based around how I could run in a healthy way, rather than feeling shame for not running enough or quickly enough, or the harmful school PE mentality of running for punishment or failing because I hadn’t hit a fast enough pace.

A few months ago I decided to sign up for a half marathon, my first. I’m working toward that goal now.

Lately, I’ve had some seriously shitty running days where my body doesn’t want to move, even hitting my SLOWEST timed 5k pace. I’m finding joy in that too because I trust my body to get through those awful runs and still be able to move, even if I feel like I’m more a snail than a turtle. I use my interval timer hard during those runs, setting my run to 2 or 3 minutes at a time, as I KNOW I can keep going for 2 minutes.
I might have miles during a half that feel like that too - there are 13 of them! I hope I can harness this mindset and know that I can get through the parts that feel awful. There is some mental resilience building up that I’ve never had before with physical activities that don’t come easily.