Dating S.O.S

Running is becoming a big part of my life these days, ever since I discovered the main benefit to it and it became my main motivator: it is time for me to be alone, no phones, no internet, no family, no friends, just me.

Today I came to a stunning discovery that healed me from my previous excuses not to run/exercise: the feeling that I “cannot run”. The proof I was drawing from to support this often-used-comment is the fact that when I start running, I can’t finish a song (i.e. run for more than 3 min) without walking to catch my breath. Now, I think that aside from my heart having to keep up there was more to my problem than just my level of fitness: it was a psychological block.

How did I solve the problem? I kept running! Certain songs on my iPod made me not think, and thus in a sense forget that I already should have been tired and walking. I think I was so used to thinking I “can’t” run, that I would stop and walk even when my heart rate was fine and my breathing was in check.

Having said that, I do have the run-walk-run-walk pattern when I first start out. This is perhaps also the reason I previously gave up; I couldn’t run far without feeling like my heart was going crazy. Today I discovered that after “warming up” I just keep on running. I don’t go very fast, but at least I managed to run almost constantly on my return trip (only stopped for a light once!).

Running stats for the day:
- 4.16 miles
- 450 calories burned, approximately (I think this assumes I ran a constant speed, which I did not…)

Want to track your own run? Map it here. There is a neat saving function that allows you to save the map and your stats, make sure you copy the URL though, because there is no way to go back to it otherwise.

Here is a map of my run today, half of it was in walk-run-walk mode, but the other half was constant running:

All “Best Year of my Life” Columns:
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