Monday, September 10, 2007

One

On Saturday morning I was scheduled to run 10 miles. Unfortunately, when I woke up on Saturday I discovered that I had misplaced my motivation. As you might guess, this is a somewhat common occurrence for me and I began looking for my lost motivation in the usual places. Was it still in bed, hiding under the covers? Nope. Was it in the pantry? Nope. Was it between the cracks in the sofa? Nope. It was nowhere to be found.

Without my motivation it was going to be tough to get outside and run my 10 miler. I debated just putting the run off altogether and that's when I drew the attention of the nagging voice in my head that I think of as the runner inside of me. He used to be the jogger inside of me and I used to be able to shut him up with donuts but he's been getting a lot louder and harder to ignore in recent months. "We HAVE to go run!" he kept telling me. After an hour of unsuccessfully trying to find something else to do I begrudgingly agreed with the runner inside of me, got my gear on and headed out the door.

One of the tricks that has always worked for me when I don't feel like running is to tell myself that I'll just go run one mile and then be done. That's usually good enough to get me out the door, and then once I start running I'll go ahead and run further, usually completing the run that I was scheduled to do. It's a great trick that my inner runner plays on me, and it always works. At least it HAS always worked. On Saturday morning as I headed out for my run the runner inside of me was feeling pretty smug, but I was still not feeling very good about it at all. It came as quite shock to my inner runner when I arrived back home after having completed one measly mile. I had barely even broken a sweat and I was finished.

As I walked through the back door of our house I happened across my ever supportive wife. She looked at her watch as if to see how long I'd been gone, raised an eyebrow and asked "are you injured?" all very cleverly calculated to make me feel guilty. Don't think for a second that she needed to look at her watch to know how long I'd been gone or that she thought I might be injured. I think my inner runner had phoned ahead and asked her to be there when we got home.
"Uhhh. No. Not injured, just done" I replied. I attempted to walk past her into the house and she moved into my path. A brief discussion ensued with her trying to motivate me to go back out and run and me extolling the virtues of the one mile training run. It ended when she played what she thought was the ace up her sleeve:
"You can be done if you promise to post on your blog that you only ran 1 mile today!"

So there it is dear readers. I ran 1 mile on Saturday, sans motivation. While I'm thinking of it, if anyone finds my motivation please return it to me. It's kind of a tabby color and answers to the name Figment.

16 comments:

  1. Ah, I have lost my motivation on Saturday mornings as well. I think at the early hour its easy to misplace things. But don't worry, tabby-colored motivations by the moniker of "figment" usually come traipsing back after a brief spell. No need to print up posters for the telephone poles quite yet.

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  2. Hee hee, Figment? You are too funny. I love your wife!!

    You'll get it back. Hang in there.

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  3. Motivation? We don't need no stinking motivation!

    Or so the line in the movie goes!

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  4. I think I saw "Figment" yesturday strolling down the street looking for you. He should be home shortly, and you can make up then.

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  5. If you ask your wife, I'm sure she knows where the motivation is. Us wives know where EVERYTHING is. Those holey crusty tighty whiteys you wore 2 days? They're under the bed. The fungus filled socks you wore to baseball practice you wore last week? They're in the corner of the bathroom ;-)

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  6. OH really sorry, I must have wandered off with it over the weekend. But I overused it and now I"m all sick, so you can have it back...it was pretty great motivation though.

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  7. Have you looked in the gooey yumminess of about a dozen chocolate chip cookies? I usualy find that after I down a bunch of those my motivation returns and tells me to get out there and redeem myself. Hope you find it soon!

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  8. I do the same - just run for 1 mile, or just run for 30 minutes, etc. I generally do more once I am into it. But, my mind is definitely not as smart as my body - and my body wins. I was supposed to do 20 minutes (YES, 20 MINUTES!) today and I couldnt motivate. I know for a fact that if I went out for just one mile I would have done the 20 minutes ... but thats exactly why I didnt even do that!

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  9. Last I checked, my inner motivation had run off to Vegas to hit the slot machines. Like acting, exercise is difficult without a motivation, yours or someone else's. As a last resort, I borrowed my hiking partner's motivation. She has recently taken to sleeping in, and finding quite captivating reasons for not exercising. Probably this means I should return her motivation and go find my own again. Hmmmn... naah.

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  10. All I have to say is congratulations on your 1 mile. It beats out my 2 miles, the loop entitled "why did I even bother?"

    I think now, because of this, I am going to have to devise a half mile route. I think I'll call it "I shaved my legs for this?"

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  11. Just for future reference ... do your mile, then have a nap on a park bench for whatever the time your run should take. Splash some water over your face and body before returning home to look like you worked up a real sweat.

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  12. The one miler is my very favorite run. Good job!

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  13. They're are couch potatoes in pittsburgh that would love to do your one mile. Well, maybe they wouldn't during football season.

    Anyway, Figment was out playing golf with Lost, my motivation on Saturday. The good news is, they both suck at golf and will be coming home for something they know their good at - running.

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  14. Same thing happened to me, but on Sunday. I had zero motivation (and a messed up knee) and 18 miles on the schedule. I made it 12.5 before I gave it up.

    If I see your motivation around, I'll send it back your way.

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  15. I find that when I am not motivated to just skip it altogether. I mean can't do this all the time but I always find that the next day I feel more motivated since I skip the day before. Yeah, that reasoning makes no sense to me either. Like I said, can't be doing that all the time. But way to go on that 1 miler. Must have seem like 10.

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  16. The promise to run one mile is often what gets me out there when I'm otherwise not feeling motivated.

    And on Sunday, I also chooped a 10-mile run into a 6-miler because I had my water bottle taken/stolen where I had left it.

    Anyway, glad to be at your blog!

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