Back on the Joggin’ Wagon

I’m back on the walk/jogging wagon.  It’s painfully wonderful.  On Monday night, I went about 3 miles around the park.  I did intervals with 30 seconds of slow jogging followed by 90 seconds of fast walking.  About 1/3 of the way through the mind games started, I forgot how challenging those negative thoughts are to overcome.  While physically I knew I could do it, mentally it was a whole different story.  I had forgotten my headphones at work which help to drowned out those negative thoughts.  Instead it was me and those thoughts, the words kept repeating themselves.   One particular thought really got under my skin, “What makes you think you are capable and good enough to do this?”.  This was followed by “what makes you think you are strong enough?”.  With that, I really started to wonder why in the world I thought I could do this, why I was doing this and what the value in it is.   No matter how much I tried to pump myself up, the negative kept at me.  I an effort to not let it overcome me, I decided to give myself a break and decided to just stop thinking about my emotions.  I instead focused on the sights around me.  I took it 30 seconds at a time and didn’t worry about how long it would take me or the next interval coming up.  At the last part of the run, I decided I needed to do something to prove the negative thoughts wrong.  I thought about how strong my Mom told me I was and I thought back to everything I’ve overcome.  With that, I jogged 4 minutes straight, I fought back tears of joy as I slowly and steadily jogged.  I kept my breathing steady and calm and just kept running through the feeling of uncomfortable (back pain, ankle pain, leg cramps etc).  I kicked the negative thoughts right in the BUTT, it was AWESOME!!!!!!  I’m still giddy, my first real jog in a very very long time and I jogged 4 minutes straight.   My legs are still sore today, but I joke they are just screaming saying THANK YOU.  I’m going to hop on the elliptical tonight and then back to some running again Thursday.  My goal is to jog at least 3 times a week to get ready for the Thanksgiving 5K.  I don’t think I’ll be able to run the whole thing, but it’s okay because I get to be there with my family doing it.      

Unstoppable “leg screaming” Mariah