Sometimes beautiful things come to me while I am running. Not always… sometimes the whole run is simply my body screaming at me to make the pain stop :) But today I was able to think about the metrics by which I measure my success in running.

Back a few years ago — we had a trainer for our dog when she was about 8 months old. The training was really more training for us then for her. Let’s just say we both learned a lot. The trainer came everyday and put us both through the paces.

What was really good about the training was that this guy really had a good understanding of how dogs learn. How simple they are. And he gave really interesting perspective on how to make training (and habits) stick for dogs…. and simple humans I guess. He really focused us on thinking about how to make the things we were teaching our dog “stick”. How to train so that the training became second nature. Habit.

I’m going to use teaching a dog to “sit” as an example. When you are teaching a dog to sit, you have to do it in a variety of places and under a lot of different conditions. You have to teach them that when you say SIT it means sit even if you are on carpet, grass, asphalt, or in the car. You have to teach them that sit means sit whether it’s raining or sunny. You have to teach them they have to do it whether they are running at full speed or at a slow walk. Sit means sit if the TV is on or if there is a cat. You have to teach them that you mean sit no matter what. To get them to really understand what sit is, you have to expose them to a bunch of different conditions.

I figure out a way to run when I have no childcare. I have run in the extreme heat in Florida. I braved the hills in NJ. I joined a gym in Florida. I am back at the gym even though I’ve been sick for a week. I have gotten myself up early so I can run in the mornings. I have run at night. Not death or grief has stopped me. I have not let other commitments take higher priority then my health. I have not let any relationship “issues” with other people pull me away from running. I have spontaeously fit excercise into my life. I’ve not been derailed by all the normal things that usually derail me. It’s now been more then 7 months and I have stuck with it. Considering that 60% of adults are not active at all. And more then 95% of adults who commit to exercise 3x a week fall off the wagon before month 4…

Let me just say: I am very proud of myself.

When I was running today, I really allowed myself to bathe in the glow of the success of knowing that I have made this commitment and it’s sticking. It’s easy for me to focus my metrics of success on speed, distance or endurance. But in truth, the real success that I need to claim is that I have made fitness a part of my life under a variety of conditions. I am commited. I am not just paying fitness commitment lipservice.

So I didn’t run as far as I wanted today.
I didn’t run as fast as I wanted to today.
I wasn’t able to run as far without walking as I wanted.
But I ran. And I put in 50 mins of activity and have done so regularly since end of January.

And that is quite an accomplishment for anyone…. let alone a former 360 lb fat girl :)

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