We're Breaking Up

After a 15 year relationship of ups and downs plus plenty of sweat, blood, and tears, we're finally putting a stop to the madness. This wasn't an easy decision. I put in lots of long hours in trying to make it work, but it's time to face the facts, I just can't do it anymore.

So, it's official.

I'm breaking up with running.

This truly is a case of "it's not you it's me." Running didn't do anything wrong exactly. The problems started with how I view running. For you to really understand this decision we've got to back up a bit.

This is from a triathlon a did a few years back

Growing up I was a swimmer. It pretty much took up all of my free time. I was in the pool 6 days a week for 2 to 2 and half hours usually with an extra hour added on for dry land {weights, running, etc} a day. In the summer and even towards the end of my swimming "career" we did two-a-days. Weekends consisted not of parties and hanging out with friends, but traveling to swim meets or extra hard practices. Are you getting the picture that it was my life?

I loved competing and loved being in the pool, but I've just now started to realize how much it influenced how I think about exercise. Even after I quit swimming, going to work out 30 minutes or even a hour a day 3 times a week wasn't enough. In my mind, it had to be 2+ hours everyday or it was none at all. I would get obsessed with working out and then when I couldn't maintain that routine because life got in the way I would quit all together.  When I would try to get back into a working out I would get so overwhelmed and frustrated with my body not being use to handling that kind of stress that I would quit again. It became a vicious cycle. *I am in no way blaming swimming or competitive sports for my way of thinking. I know that I'm naturally prone to that "all or nothing, black and white" thinking,*

Recently I was on a walk, where I was judging myself for walking and not running, when I began to think about the unhealthiness and craziness in how I think about exercise. Then, on July 4th a friend and I were running and we started talking about we really didn't enjoy running at all. It hurts my knees and it gets kinda boring. I got to thinking "if I'm not having fun why the heck am I doing this?!" It had never really occurred to me before that I didn't have to do this.

And so, that's how I decided that I'm breaking up with running.

Obviously, running isn't the problem. The problem is in how I think about exercise. Running just happens to be the one exercise I always thought I had to do.

I'm not saying I'll never run again, but from now on I'll run because I want to and not because I have to.