Fit For Real Life

I seem to have subconsciously taken on a mental challenge that I’m not sure I really wanted to take on, but yet, here I am. Did you ever get halfway into something before you realized, “well, how did we get here?” Well, that is where this runner stands in the dead of a Midwest winter that includes non-shoveled sidewalks on all city streets, thereby forcing you to run down a 4 lane road…which has the occasional car flying by with driver inside texting away while eating a breakfast sausage sandwich, or something like that.

Since I’d prefer not to be hood ornament, I’ve taken to the treadmill for the bulk of my running this winter. Which is fine when I get to use a treadmill that has a tv by it so I can listen to music and watch a show while I run my little heart out. But that has not been the case lately, and since I’ve decided that I need to run till, I don’t know, I puke(?) at least once a week – for the sake of being somewhat quick this summer (when I’m running a half marathon in Iceland w/ a dear friend & training partner – woo hoo!), it means there is some painful, but “good painful” runs to be had.

There is a method to the puke-y madness each week, specific training runs to be done, and so on.  But there I am, running away, and the treadmill I am lucky enough to use, is facing out a picture window – to a small patch of what is grass 9 months out of the year, and a few trees and bushes. And above the picture window is a quote painted on the wall, “The surest way not to fail is to determine to succeed.”

So yeah, running hard, harder than you’d like to, and you’ve got the pleasure of enjoying some time alone with your brain, the quote on the wall, and the window. And your brain is not really thrilled you’re running this hard. So here is where I said, ’so yeah, great, time for Kate to get serious about thinking, visualizing – you know – the whole being “present” for your workout thing.’ I vaguely recall running a marathon like this years ago before the invention of the ipod, and runners forever have had to train without music while out on the road…and somehow we all survived. But you know, it’s nice to hear Timbaland and Anberlin push you through the miles!

But present I am now for these runs, and what has kept me going? Well, watching the squirrels out the window bury their nuts and now searching frantically for them. This week, a squirrel was going ballistic on the mini-lawn, jumping in mid-air & grabbing his tail while jumping…very bizzare. So much so that I was a little worried because maybe he had rabies, and how would I get out the door to go home later because I had to walk past his patch of rabies filled land, and should I call Animal Control, and “no I didn’t forget I was trying to pull my arms back and get 3 steps per second, but it helped to have the rabies filled squirrel to watch, but I still don’t know how I’m going to get out if he’s out there later.”

This was my mind for the better portion of the workout. Sigh.

And on one recent descending tempo run (thank you Jen, I thought I might die on this lovely adventure, but if you’re going to TRX, then I’m going to run descending tempo runs!) I decided to deconstruct the quote on the wall. Every. Single. Word. What does each word mean? How does each word work with the words before it? How do I feel about each word? You, my reader, do realize that the word “the” appears in that quote – and yes, I spent at least 5 minutes thinking about the word “the”. Oh my, the things we do to focus during a workout.

But there is a blessing in these moments. One, its a beautiful reminder of the fact that the mind is a powerful thing & one that every person, whether average Joe or elite athlete, or somewhere in the murky middle, needs to remember as they go after their health & fitness goals. If you let your mind tell you, “it’s hard,” “it hurts,” “I don’t want to”, your mind will send signals back out to you that verify that it IS hard, it DOES hurt, and you DON’T want to. And if that’s the case, please step out of the human race, you’re blocking the way for someone else. But I don’t think that’s you - so remember, your mind is a terrible thing to waste, so use it to your advantage when you’re prepping for and executing your workout. Two, these moments are when you figure out where you stand. Are you willing to push the envelope a bit each time? Are you serious about saying “I’m going to accomplish (x) for this workout, and then actually doing it? Sometimes, we stop short of what our body can actually do because we’re stuck counting reps, watching the treadmill countdown timer, or waiting for Oprah to come back from commercial to realize what we’re actually doing during our workout.

So check in with yourself the next time you go workout and see just how “present” you’ve been lately. If you’ve been dialed in – fantastic! If you’ve been jus waiting for the time to end – you should get on a treadmill & stare out a window for a bit!