The Day I Stopped Making Excuses

Alright, let's rewind. It was maybe... May-ish? No more like March, I think! Joseph and I ran a 5K. We'd worked up for it, but I still had yet to run that far ever. I thought it'd be ok, but the gun sounded and I was so excited and ran so fast for about 100 yards then realized that all of my energy was gone. Add to that the fact that Joe doesn't like taking breaks in races. I wish he'd told me that sooner.

BUT he didn't tell me that and I was in it to win it. Or, rather, in it to not lose it. It made matters worse that it was a BYU race. I wasn't about to let a Ute lose a BYU race! We made it to the end after about 35 minutes of pain, and I collapsed to the ground. I pretended to be proud of myself because that's what Joseph wanted but really I was just focused on not passing out. 

And then I didn't run for months after that. It wasn't just that the 5K was hard on me, we both were getting sick, and then one of us would get better and then the other was still sick, and the other would get better and then the first one would get sick again... Sick juggling game.

And then there were schedules to deal with, there wasn't really a good time to run.

And then we found the perfect time, this summer. Mornings. I had 3 mornings a week where I'd get on the train at around 10am, leaving us plenty of time to get up and go in the mornings. The first three mornings, Joseph did. I'd lay in bed and say I was sick. Sometimes I really was, most times I was faking. Or I'd say I had a headache, or didn't sleep well... And Joe would go and I'd lay in bed.

And then one morning I got up and ran. It was a flashback to that really hard 5K for me. That run that morning was for some reason, very hard. And I had allergies. What the heck! Never had those before! Why then?! 

Eventually Joseph would stop asking me if I wanted to go running. He'd get up and go and I'd lay in bed.

I'd think about how I walk a lot at school. I'd think about how I'm eating healthy now so that's ok? But I couldn't do running in the mornings. I really couldn't. So I didn't. And my fancy expensive running shoes sat in the closet and cried to themselves.

The thing was, I wasn't pleased with what I was. I've finally come to terms with me being a naturally small-framed person. I can't tell you how long it took for me to realize that. And eating healthy and drinking a ton of water has done glorious things for my appearances and moods and health in general. But still I wasn't quite where I wanted to be. See, there's a difference between being small and being actually fit. In fact, I can name off a few handfulls of people who have slightly larger frames but are far more fit than I am, and you can tell. The point is, I got tired of not looking fit, but more than that, not feeling fit. Long story short, I wasn't satisfied with who I was. But running in the mornings was HARD! That was my excuse. 

This last week, something snapped. I was tired of making excuses for myself. I was tired of feeling less than my very best. So I asked for advice on how to get the motivation to run again, and someone suggested night running. I had explicitly stated, when asking for advice, that there wasn't time at nights to run. That was a slight lie. There was time to run at nights if I made time, so I did.

That night I ran faster and further than I think I ever have. I felt more endurance than I ever had. I could brag about my pace or distance... but overall that's not the point of this post.

The point of the post is that fitness is hard. Exercising is hard. But you need to find what works for you! Mornings clearly were not for me. They are for Joseph, but not for me. It may be more challenging to find time to run at night, but that's when I need to run to actually RUN. Finding that time is worth it, to me. 

And lastly, you can talk about going to the gym all you want. You can strap on your running shoes and go around the block a few times. But until you really want to change, you won't. Until you have a goal in mind of what you want to reach, you won't really change. So set a goal, and set steps and deadlines to reach that goal. My goal is to actually look like I have muscles on me, but more than that, it's to feel good, to feel fit, because there is a difference.

Well, one more thing. It really helps to put on some music when you work out. I was running to Coldplay before, which I love... but it wasn't motivating me right, so I looked up some work out stations on Pandora and man. The power songs made a difference. 

ANYWAYS thanks for reading!