'Dream On'

As I sit here writing to you all tonight, I am still living off the runner's euphoria that comes after completing a great race. I just did another 5k, it was at Twilight and the route was all along Bristol's harbourside. It was beautiful, the weather was in my favour- not hot, not cold. Damp from earlier but no rain. I completed it in 45 minutes and 14 seconds. Which is nearly 11 minutes off my time in July. So I'm happy, I'm too awake and muscle weary but happy.

Flash back nine hours and you'd see a VERY different picture. I woke up not feeling very well, I can feel the wetter, damper weather beating down my immune system and a cold is almost sure to follow. I lay in bed feeling sorry for myself and was trying everything I could to say it was okay if I didn't compete. I wouldn't be damaging anyone. This is, of course, a lie. I would have damaged myself and my confidence had my lazier urges (Oatmeal's 'the Blerch) won out. As some context I should explain that this came off of the laziest week I've had on this programme. I haven't been gymming nearly as frequently, I've been lazy with my cooking, lazy with my tracking and just didn't feel bad enough to do anything about it. In general (other than some self inflicted boy troubles) everything is going pretty damn well in my life. I'm loving my studies, I feel positive about my abilities and I wasn't feeling NEGATIVE about my weight loss. I'd just became complacent. And so, it'll come as no surprise that I gained weight. I wasn't surprised by this gain but it was a sense of shame for me and lead me not to tell anyone about it. I didn't want to be reminded every time I talked about it that I'd just been a lazy git. Or worse, I'd come to terms with a gain even before I got on the scale, having people say 'oh that's too bad!' or something similar may just have made me feel worse than I would just within my own head. This was not one of those occasions where nature just was conspiring against me and kept my weight the same or secreted in a sneaky pound. Sometimes it's exhausting trying to be the person you want to be for yourself and all of the others who care deeply about supporting your efforts and it's even worse having someone pick out your faults- even if they do so in a non-judgmental manner.

This should have been a line in the sand where I just learn from the mistakes of the past week (of which I could easily see many) and move forward, but this sense of complacency was still there. It was still there this morning when I didn't want to run, it was still there minutes before I donned my running shoes and headed out the door.

And yet, now that it's done, I have the clarity to see just how very important doing this race was to me. It gave me back some of my edge, some of my drive and reminded me of why I'd come to love fitness and activity so much. I just feel better, even now when my feet are a bit sore and my legs feel heavy and uncooperative, I feel better than I did before. Doing this race showed me how far I'd come- 11 minutes difference in 4 months is nothing to be sniffed at! It made me once again think about how I nourish my body and how it nourishes me and that, even when it gets hard and all you want to do is order those onion rings, I need to take care of this body I have and this includes not limiting yourself just because it may be 'easier'. If fitness and activity were 'easy' everyone would be doing it.

So, as I crossed the finishing line with Neil Patrick-Harris singing 'Dream On' in my ears to the cheers of the wonderful people who came out to support and gained my medal (let's be honest, I'm in this for the cheddar) I felt once again, renewed. I am capable of so much more than I would ever have thought- I just have to try.

Here's a motivational Bruce Lee quote for your Sunday morning. It seemed appropriate for this post.