Getting My Priorities Right

• Posted: September 25, 2008
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• Author: Shéamus
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• Filed under: Motivation, Observations, Workouts
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• Tags: No tags set for this entry.

After much thought following yesterday’s whimsical post, I decided that I needed to make some changes, and fast. I woke again still hating running, still hating the idea of getting ‘out there’, certainly if it meant the ten or so miles I needed to log to keep myself on track for the challenge. To be honest, I couldn’t think of anything worse.

I’m not somebody who throws in the towel easily, but as I said before looking back now this was a mistake. A big one. I simply wasn’t ready to move up to this level of mileage this quickly. One fifty-mile week - which I’ve just had - would have been fine. Two back-to-back, with everything else going on in my life right now, was quite a bit far short of clever. Even if everything else had been optimum, it would have been a bit of a stretch - as it is, the entire experience has left me feeling really lousy.

What was worrying me most was that two days ago I actually considered chucking it all in - that’s how bad I was feeling. Not just the mini-challenge - everything, the whole 365 days and all.

Something had to give - and it wasn’t going to be me.

I needed to get back to basics. I needed to remember what this was all about, when it all started, way back when. I needed to fall in love with running again.

So, it’s fairly clear that I’m going to fall a little short of my plan to run 100 miles in two weeks. I’m still going to log a reasonable number over this fortnight, and I’m pretty proud and happy of my first fifty-mile week that I just logged. But I need to get my priorities right. I need to get my head straight.

I’m in the process of not only changing jobs, but careers. Out with the old and in with the new. But with that comes great power and responsibility a lot of technical work (new email accounts, etc) and set-up (computers, accountants, salary stuff, blah blah blah). My days are getting eaten up. I want my run to be something that I not only look forward to, but a thing that frees me from the rest of the day. Not something that is as much of a burden with in it. In all honesty, and with no attempt to exaggerate or over-dramatise, it’s felt like a bit of a shackle this past week or so.

So, today, I took it right back to the start, and went out for a simple 20-minute run, trying to get a little speed back into my legs. Trying to feel good. Trying to get back how it used to feel.

Splits:

I’ll let you know if it’s worked in a couple of days. But I can tell you this much - knowing that I don’t have to run 8, 9 or 10 miles tomorrow feels pretty darn good right now.

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