The Joy of Running

As I was running around the neighborhood on Saturday, I felt inspired that my next blog post should be about running.  I wondered why this was, but it was the act of wondering that brought me to my answer.

Running is the most basic of activities.  Clara and Henry both love running around while laughing wildly.  There doesn't need to be anything added to the activity for it to be completely and totally engaging for them.  This is not a unique experience for children.  I remember when I was a child that running was part of several activities that were some of my favorites (Tag, Hide 'n' Seek, Red Light/Green Light, etc.).

Running is also difficult to be good at.  What I mean by that is that beyond childhood, running does not come naturally.  I've been running off and on for about a year now and every time that I take any kind of break, I lose a lot of progress that I had made.  For example, when I was running around Boomer Lake in Stillwater, I worked my way up to about a seven-and-a-half minute-per-mile pace.  I've been running here in Maryland for about six weeks and I've nearly made it to an eight mpm pace.  I'm shaving seconds off every time I run, but I've still got quite a ways to go to make it back up to where I was.  Why was it so easy as a kid but it's so hard as an adult?  Part of it is that as a kid, I never ran very far.  Short bursts of speed around the playground or backyard was all I was interested in.  Distance running is a very different creature.  In a sprint, I can run much fast than the eight mpm, but I can't maintain that for very long.  Part of the art of distance running is figuring out what pace to go.

Running is a race - against yourself.  I am not a competitive person.  As long as I do my best, I am happy with my efforts, even if I lose (which is why I can't do sales).  When running, there's always a part of me that wants to stop or at least slow down; since I have some breathing problems (likely due to an undiagnosed deviated septum), this part of me is hard to ignore.  But there's also a part of me that wants to finish quickly and beat my last time.  Part of the attraction to running is that as time goes on, the second voice wins more and more often.  I've only run in one race as an adult (but I think I'll run another 10K this summer) and I didn't care that there were lots of people that passed me as I ran.  I was happy to just do my best and ignore the part of me that wanted to stop.

I wrote this post because I know that there are some of my audience that know the joy that comes from running, but I also know that there are some who simply think of running as something that is hard and not for them.  I would encourage you to give running another try.  I hope that I've made it clear that running is hard, even for someone like me who enjoys it.  But a lot of worthwhile and good things are hard.  I think running is one of them.  (I've also mentioned another reason I like running before.)