The other day I walked down my driveway, pushing Z in the stroller. And when I got to the end of my block, I started running.
It was on the early side, around 8 am, and it was still cool for July. Maybe sixty degrees with the kind of overcast sky that just makes all the neighborhood garden colors go so oversaturated in contrast.
I remember thinking I was glad I wasn’t on the east coast (sorry east coasters, that was the during your big heat-wave-power-loss-boom! event).
Everything around me just looked so green and alive and I just felt so alive. I loved every breath I was taking and the clarity of being able to appreciate it all in the moment and I thought…
I almost missed this.
I did, I almost missed that moment. Because for the longest time I thought I loved myself too much to make myself go running.
Let’s rewind–to, oh I don’t know, any time since my teens when I decided to take up running. Maybe once every couple of years, I would decide I needed to lose weight (and get healthy, of course.) (But mostly lose weight.)
And I would decide that running would be the best exercise to take up. Why? Because it was the hardest and most excruciating of course!
So I would run. It would hurt. I would get red-faced and I’d feel that stabbing pain in my lungs and the too-fast beating of my heart and I would count down the minutes, the seconds, the steps until I could stop. And as all the blood rushed into my head I’d think somehow, this is what I deserve.
I have to do this to make myself different.
If I just keep doing this every day I’ll be okay.
After doing this a few times, I would say–screw that.
(Not consciously. Consciously, I would find excuses and promise to go tomorrow. But some part of me deep down was rejecting that message: that I had to hurt myself. That I needed to change.)
And so I would stop. And eventually I stopped trying altogether.
Even though, I do kind of like the idea of being a runner.
Even though sometimes, some of them, look like they are having fun.
Even though my body is built to move.
Then six weeks ago, I read this and I thought, wait–what if I could run and not hurt? What if I could go at a pace that feels good to my body?
Whoa, whoa, whoa. That idea took the whole foundation of my relationship with exercise and turned it on its head.
And so here I am again, doing the same exact thing, but in a completely different way. It turns out, I didn’t need to change myself, I needed to change running. Running is a wholly new thing to me now, it’s amazing that it is even the same activity I was engaging in before. It needs a better word or something.
So that’s how to love running when you don’t love running: Go really slow. I mean, really slow. Slower than you thought possible to run and still be moving. Slower than people walking past you. (You’ll get faster eventually, I promise, but don’t worry about that now.)
I never thought I would write this but now, I love the days I go running. I run my run, and I think my thoughts out in the world, and so far Z doesn’t mind being in the stroller too much…and I can’t believe I almost missed this.
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As a fellow non-runner turned runner, YAY! There’s something really magical about running, that I never got back when I was a non-runner.
Incidentally, there’s really no need to get faster, although if you want to, you can and will. After just a couple of years of running 2-3 times per week (and sometimes not for a week or two at a time) I’m now running at paces and distances I never, ever, EVER imagined possible for me.
Hurray!
Hurray!! You are so totally one of my inspirations, Shannon. You marathon-runner-you!
Oh Eileen,
This could just possibly change everything for me too. Oooo.
Thank you.
Oooo Pauline, that makes me so happy! One of my secret missions now is to build a worldwide army of super-slow but wildly enthusiastic runners. Do join us!
Ah yes!
It could be a part of the ‘slow’ movement.
You know…slow food etc
I can see it now…it would fit perfectly.
My attention has been grabbed.
I’ll start with curious…
First, see if I can find my running shoes (I actually think they’re in storage – that wasn’t one of the good excuses was it)
Then try out to find what my version of super slow looks like
And keep reporting back on progress towards ‘wildly enthusiastic’.
Fun!
Yes! this has been utterly revelatory for me – moving my body doesn’t have to hurt. I never ever thought i would actually enjoy it. And so you can imagine how gobsmacked I am to find that running is one of the loveliest, kindest things I do for myself these days.
Love your blog x
Thanks so much for the kind words
So happy to have met a fellow SSWE (super-slow wildly enthusiastic runner!! tee hee) *smooches*
So…I did it.
Went and found my trainers (running shoes), they were in storage and I dug them out. And then I ran, for half an hour, 50:50 on the run:walk and felt positively marvellous.
Then that night, I dreamt I could barely walk after the running, and that my hip was suffering badly. So sure I was that it was real, I nearly fell down when I actually got out of bed, walked, and all was well.
Strange non? How curious. And intriguing.
Day off today and back again tomorrow for day 2.
I think I’ve got the ‘slow’ bit down…will report back on the wildly enthusiastic part as it develops.
YAYYYY!!! PAULINE!!! Woot woot! Congratulations. That is so awesome. Slow is the best, isn’t it? And you don’t have to be wildly enthusiastic, I’ll do it for both of us for now
Deal!
I do the slow running (with curious, but not yet wildly enthusiastic, look on face), you do the wildly enthusiastic and we’ll see what transpires!
Sounds like a plan.
Hi Elieen,
I never thought of googling “how to not hate running” but I have tried so many ways and read so much stuff, but none of them worked for me
. I’m only 24 yrs old and have been trying to run for the last 3 years, I did everything but running seems to be my worst nightmare. Till today, that in the result of my searching your blog came up to the first one on top. Reading your story really impressed me and is giving me the push to try running again in a completly new way. Thank You so much for sharing! And I’m sure a new reader of your blog! Love it!
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