Sunday August 1, 2010

"Before you can even try to change an undesirable trait, you have to zero in on exactly what it is that you need to change and why." - Joyce Brothers

What a ground-breaking day today was.  I ran my first 8 kilometer run - solo.  For those of you who know me, and even those of you who don't.  It's probably not hard to tell what a feat this would be. 

I have always thought that I needed to wear my ipod when running to avoid the distraction of pounding feet on the pavement.  What I learned today, is that my feet aren't the problem - it's my head.  It's amazing when left to my own devices, the aches/pains and excuses that I can come up with:

- Oh, my ass hurts
- Is that my hip flexer again?
- My legs hurt so much
- Who's going to know if I just walk?
- Are you crazy?
- No one's going to care if you walk, you're only letting yourself down.
- I didn't know that Don't Need Nothing, But a Good Time was so slow. 
- My ass hurts.

Despite all of this, I still managed to keep going, even if my methodolgy was as little less than orthodox.  A few longer than should be rest periods to get my head back in the game.  There was some realization about an hour in that I could possibly beat my time of last Sunday.  This appeared to be my motivation for the rest of my run and I was able to run these 8k, 4 minutes faster than the previous week.  I will need to work harder on getting those negative thoughts out my head (and possibly use the Playlist Function from iTunes)

On a side note, I would like to thank Cellutel for putting reflective windows in their building.  It was a treat to watch my pastey little legs as I ran past their building - looks like spray tan scores the first point.

Looking forward to working out in the park tomorrow!