The Quest for a Mile

So, today, I got home from a very long day, wary of the even longer day that I know I'm going to have to have tomorrow, and I was feeling sorry for myself in general. (Tomorrow is going to be one grueling meeting after another, most of which seem to revolve around either my incompetence as a teacher since I can't seem to satisfy this insurmountable workload, or committees which will be discussing eliminating my job altogether. I have a bad feeling that I will be lucky to get through the day tomorrow without crying ... and I can't tell you how much I dread that.) So I got dressed in my workout clothes with all the speediness of a snail, and lowered my treadmill to the ground, and stared at it.

Nope. How can you run with a dead battery? No. I wussed out.

So I took Lola for a walk, with my tail between my legs. I had some thinking to do.

With the autumn breeze blowing, and walking out in the fields with my wiggly little black lab puppy, I had this following thought:

How can I be Jogging Auburn if I don't jog?

Does that just make me Auburn?

Is being Just Auburn working for me? .... no.

So, then, I'm a hypocrite. Not living up to my name. The name I gave myself for this moment, to remind myself that that is who I want to be, even if it is not who I am.

How can I continue to blog about the Quest for a Mile if I'm scared to jog? If I'm too drained to jog?

So I got home, and decided that I needed to jog again. But I also knew in my heart of hearts that I am starting off with a battery that is much more drained than back in the summer, which I enjoyed the delicacy of regular sleeping habits and lack of stress.

And I also remembered that I promised myself back in the day that I would not make myself jog at a pace that seemed unattainable, that was not fun, that was too hard. And I simply knew that I could not jog for one minute increments.

And then I briefly felt disgusted.

And then I picked myself back up again and thought, "Well, what CAN you do? Can you jog for 30 second increments?"

And I decided that surely I could jog for thirty seconds at a time.

And I thought that I need to pursue that Quest again. I WANT TO BE ABLE TO RUN A MILE! So, I am going to jog every day, at what I can do that day, until I can jog for 2 minute increments. Then I will begin to add in cross-training.

So, I jogged tonight. Jogged for 30 seconds, walked for 2 minutes. I only was able to go a little over thirty minutes before I got dizzy enough that I almost fell off the treadmill, and I remembered that I wouldn't push myself beyond what was safe/attainable, so I gave it a rest.

It is a Start. It is a Renewal. It is a Beginning. It is the Quest.

And I can do this. One step at a time.

With y'all's help, of course. :)

Posted in: discouragement, dog walking, jogging on Wednesday, October 21, 2009 at at 8:52 PM