Guess who's back, back again? Guess who's back, tell your friends...I found my inner Eminem!
Ok let's jump right into it. I had a REALLY tough time letting go of my half marathon. Obviously, from my lack of posts, I had some stuff I needed to sort out and definitely left some of you hanging. A good thing though is that although my posts have been missing, my followers have not as this blog now reaches as far East as China and as far south as Australia! Woot!
I want to go into this past month with you for some insight. After the run, as for many runners, there is a burnout phase. You simply have no desire to run and you want to get back on a schedule that doesn't have running times dictate what you can and cannot do on Friday nights and over the weekend. You want to reconnect with the friend-dates you put on hold for the training. And you want to eat whatever the heck you darned well pleased. Shoot, after not being able to eat the day of the race, the next week feels like you have a hunger that is insatiable.
After that initial week, I decided that I was going to allow my foot to heal completely. In a bad and good way, I stopped all cardio. What's bad is that I didn't seek alternatives that would be less invasive on my foot, but still allowed my heart to get pumping. What's good is that I actually allowed it to heal 100%-what you'll find with any athlete, runner, etc. is that there is a constant struggle to continue and a stubbornness to not let it heal because the competitive drive in you wants to keep moving forward and not get weak.
Week 2 of this burnout was a major gorgefest and week 3 landed me in tears one night telling my husband that I was "falling" aka failing in this journey. Have you ever felt yourself sliding but have no way to scream it out? Or that you want someone to shake you awake but you feel like your thoughts are an outer extension of yourself and the body is paralyzed? That, in a way, was how I felt. And even though I had a cry for help in that teary moment with my husband, no one else knew about it.
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| It's hard to admit when you need help, let alone ask for it |
The remaining weeks of this past month can only be described with negative words like awful, self-depreciating, depressing, stressful. Harsh, right? I know it sounds weird, but I started to think I was a bad person, that I was too cocky, that I don't do enough 'right' by people. That coupled with a few people in my personal life telling me I wasn't as supportive as I should be about their lives or reconnecting with a friend after 9 years and hashing everything out, furthered that self-doubt and a lot of digging up emotions I worked so hard to suppress and let go of years ago. All of this added up to the one thing that kept those negative thoughts at bay: a lack of motivation to be mentally and physically fit. They really do go hand in hand. Trust me on this: if you are not a healthy, fit person physically...it is likely you are not healthy mentally either. This is not to say those that don't work out are more likely to be sociopaths, but more that they have a higher likelihood of being self-deprecating and lack a solid self-esteem.
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| How I felt pretty much the entire month of July |
So where does that leave us now? What brought me back into the swing? The answer is very simple: YOU and other people invested in my fitness. Over this past month, I have had a stream of messages come to me from various places. I had an old sorority sister reach out and send me the following message:
" So I decided to send you a message to tell you that I hope you know how encouraging you can be. Your posts about working out are inspirational. I can't say I was working out much at all in the recent past let a lone as much as I should have been, and it's friends like you posting encouraging messages and about their own work out accomplishments (and of course my own will) that's have motivated me to work out more. I've actually been sticking with it for about 3 months now. Not at any significant mile markers yet but anything is better then nothing right? Anyway. I just wanted to tell you and thank you for posting those things. Even if you didn't specifically mean them for me or realize they really would help. Also. Congrats on the run you did recently. You looked super cute and proud (and rightfully so) in the pictures. "
Naturally, I got an initial high from reading this message. Wow-someone came up to me to send this and share their journey with me. This person wanted to start a dialogue about what they are going through.
And in between that message and a later message I'll describe, I received texts from supporters asking where my posts were. Another supporter called me to "check-in" to make sure I was doing okay and wanted to tell me about their journey and struggles (I secretly believe in an attempt for me to confess what was going on with me and my journey). I even got posts on my Facebook asking where the heck my blog posts were.
A couple weeks later, I received this:
"Girl! I need some of your inspiration and tips to success as I strive to start training for this half marathon. I can't get past 3 miles ( feel like I'm dying at 3 mark! ) !!! Help!!"
All.be.damned.
Someone is asking ME for running advice? Did they not see or know how horrible I did in the race? Who am I to give advice? I'm seriously one of the slowest runners in the world! It kind of sunk in that I had done something other people may look up to. Like finishing is the dream regardless of the time for some (heck, that was my initial goal too!). Another friend told me that she wanted to start running but felt intimidated by how many miles I run now and that they wouldn't want to hold me back. Are you kidding me?! I still think a mile is a big freaking deal (even if 13.1 couldn't convince me that I'm a badass LOL).
Then, yesterday, it all came to a head. And I finally understood it. I received a package in the mail with a token and a card. The timing couldn't have been more perfect because I was seriously debating whether or not I wanted to work out at all (I had even canceled plans to run with a friend that evening) and I decided to get the mail to see how I felt about being outside for possibly a bike ride. For those of you who don't know me very well, I LOVE surprises and I LOVE mail so when I get a surprise IN the mail, it's like a double whammy. I opened up the package to discover a water bottle. The message connection instantaneously told me to get my butt in gear, right now.
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| Who would've thought that a water bottle bore so much weight as a gift?! |
A very supportive friend sent me a water bottle and a card...not just any water bottle though, but a super fancy and ultra personalized water bottle. It was as if she had bottled up motivation and sent it directly to me. Her note in the card even indicated a need for 'refreshment' that she was providing. Dear friend, you refreshed my motivation! And so I went for a 10 mile bike ride immediately. That's when it hit...I was doing the SAME thing to my friends and even people I barely know. My message was getting across through my blog, my motivational and fitness driven Facebook posts, my visible weight loss and energy by my co-workers and those around me. When I stopped stoking that fire, people noticed. How amazing it was to feel like hey, what I am doing for myself actually does matter and have an affect on others. If nothing else, it plants the seed. And even when I am not feeling motivated, somehow it still affects others.
One of the biggest shoulder's I have ever known approached me and told me they joined the gym and for 3 weeks now has been going 3 times a week. She went from nothing to something and felt the need to tell me about it. How amazing! This is the same person who said she couldn't follow my blog last year when i started it because it was too much guilt for her to read. And yet, a year later, she found her x-factor. Amazing!
What this all boils down to is the power of thought. My VERY first post was "You Change Your Life When You Change Your Mind" and my how that comes full circle today. If you think negative, you will be negative, your results will be negative and people can feed off that negativity. This month was difficult because I allowed those negative thoughts and feelings to rule my life. I let myself doubt my capabilities. I let myself get depressed. I hadn't felt this bad in awhile and duh, I had no means to feel productive and also get all that frustration out! My energy levels were low, I melted into the couch more than once, and my eating habits turned into nightly snacks that I would have vomited over watching myself eat 2 months ago.
Today, I renew my commitment to positive thought. No one can be 100% on all the time so there is going to be missteps and times where you lose faith, motivation, and positivity. The point is to accept them and then have tunnel vision to continue moving forward. Don't look back on the failures and dwell on them. Don't get upset about "what might have been" or "what should have been" but rather "what can I do to challenge myself today?" and "what can I do today to make me feel accomplished, proud of myself, and feel like a bad ass?"
This approach is so much more rewarding because let's face it, if you want to be a victim, it's the single most easiest thing to do and if you want to be depressed, it's so much easier. I liken it to the adage that it's more difficult to keep an A than to get to earning it. I have earned my spot as a woman who gives a crap about her mental and physical fitness, but KEEPING it alive and tenacious is the challenge. I have to continually come up with new challenges, new competitions, new goals and keep reinvigorating my motivation (fuel up the tank here and there). Sure, the tank will decrease fuel over time, but the onus is on me to never get below the scary, burned out level again.
So, thanks, supporters and random people that checked up on me this past month. You helped fill my tank back up...now back to racing towards my goals!
Love with ALLLLLLLLL of my bum,
CH
