Don't Believe Everything You Think

It's been about a week and a half I've been on this quest.  This week was a lot like breaking in a new pair of shoes, literally and figuratively.  I have the blisters to prove it.

The past ten days have been a new uncomfortable for me.  I'm eating more than I usually eat, I'm holding myself accountable to process, and I'm trying to fit my goals into my life, rather than to let my goals take over my life.  That said, my feet hurt, my arms hurt, I've logged great mileage this week in spite of traveling and weather and wine.  But I have a smile on my face, because I'm learning.  I'm learning that some of the things I thought about myself and my ability to accomplish this goal are completely wrong.

Back in High School, I wanted to participate in a sport not because I was good at anything, but because I was bored.  In fact, I was not good at ANY sport, really.  I joined the Cross Country team my Freshman year at Naples American High School, and I hated every minute of it.  One of the reasons I hated it was because in my mind, not even I could be that bad at running, but I was.

It's just running, right?   I had convinced a friend of mine to join the team with me and from about the second week of practice it was clear that she was WAY better at it than me.  I huffed and puffed through workouts, did a lot of walking, did even more whining (sorry, coaches, wherever you are) and really never got into it.  Half way through the season I was having asthma attacks which were brought on by the sulfur in the air in and around Naples.  I was pretty grateful that I had a really good excuse to bail out.

The next semester, though I found myself signing up for track.  I was far more committed to getting to travel all of Italy on the co-ed track team than I was actually excelling at anything.  I tried long-jump, shotput and discus.  Shotput turned out to be my 'best' sport, once I got my body to learn the throwing form.  As a team member, I was mediocre at best.  I was in to have fun, anyway.  My second season of track my sophomore year, my season was also cut short thanks to a run in with Mononucleosis.

Fast forward a million years.  I have never wanted to be better at something than I want to be at running right now.  And this week I pondered on the thought that all these years I've built these images in my mind of what "success" at the sport of running looks like.

Since reading Born to Run several years ago, this has been it.  Dean Karnazes.  I'm pretty sure no one disagrees with me- that lean body, brow furrowed in concentration, perfect stride- this is what running well looks like.

And when I created my goal, I had it in my head that unless I continued to move forward into achieving a lean physique, I could never run fast.

Well, that's bullshit.

Mostly.

Obviously I have to move toward a body more capable of running faster to achieve a 3:40.  More importantly, though, I need to exercise my mind into being capable of running a 3:40.

There are plenty of people who can run a Boston time in their age and gender groups and they don't look like Dean.  Are they lean?  Probably.  But are they perfect?  I bet not.

I have to change my perception of what I believe a body type is capable of, and following this gal has helped me-

There are stereotypes in all things, and if you visit Jessamyn's page or follow her instagram account, you will be challenged to think differently about what you think you know.  The armstand she's doing here is an advanced pose, yet she looks as effortless, balanced and beautiful as her stereotypical yogi counterparts who are sporting 17% body fat and chiseled physiques.

When 'they' say that the only limits we have are the limits we create in our minds, 'they' are 100% correct.

I am beginning to challenge the mindset that I will have to create the perfect running body in order to run my goal---  My body will do it. My body has already proved to me it is capable of more than I ever would have dreamed possible back in my high school days and my limited exposure to endurance training.  I don't have respiratory problems anymore.  I run faster than I did in high school, and I actually love it this time.

My body will catch up to my goal. It's the mind that needs the makeover.

We will, we will... stalk you...

Let's face it.  If comparison is the thief of joy then social media is Bernie Madoff.

Don't worry, this is not about the Kardashians.

You know those people that act like they don't care what anyone thinks about them, they are going to live their truth, blah blah blah?  Those people are full of crap, especially if they have a Facebook, Instagram or Twitter account.

I'd like to think that I don't look to social media for validation, but on some level I guess that's what anyone who posts anything is looking for.  Having an online life is only one side of the coin... I think more important question is, whose online lives are we looking at?

And what does that do to us?

A couple of days ago I was perusing my Instagram feed when I crossed paths with this fitness model in Australia who had had TWINS (who were also children #3 and #4) and was posting pictures of herself in a bikini WITHOUT STRETCHMARKS and nary any evidence that she'd just brought two human beings into this world who were plus or minus five pounds a piece.  She had her six pack and thigh gap back like three days postpartum.  I really wanted to hate her, I did, but I'm not an inherently hateful person.  But I found myself subconsciously listing things about her that made me feel better about myself.

Like, haha, she won't get good sleep for like the next five years.

And, she can probably afford to rub caviar all over her stomach every day to ward off those stretch marks.  I mean, I would've done that too, but I didn't know caviar worked back then.

And, I guess if your paycheck revolves around your looks, you have to make pregnancy look that awesome too.

So I wasn't trying to be a hater, but some peoples' reality is so far removed from my own that there's just no way to make a real connection.  And that, I think, is the real sadness of social media comparison.

But here's another one.  I actually "follow" her....

This woman is a superhero.  I mean seriously.  Look at her bio.  Then look closely how fast she runs.  I totally stalk her.  She's another one who had a baby and seemingly didn't take a day off or miss a workout.  Based on her posts she is trying to qualify for Boston too and I dig that. So when I need motivation, I go look at her feed and think, I don't have five kids.  I don't have a chronic disease.  If she can do this, so can I.  I am truly inspired by people, women in particular, who post this kind of unreal realness.   Her life, I can get a little closer to.

Then there's my yoga girlcrush.  

This woman makes bendy an artform.  I am not as concerned with nor do I ever desire to be an accomplished yogi, but the affirmations in her posts and her encouraging enlightenment make me want to continue practicing yoga.  Boston is one thing.  Handstands are totally another.

I think all the hate and negativity that is associated with what social media is can be completely undone when we realize and accept that what motivates us, motivates us.  And we shouldn't be ashamed of that, nor should we shy away from it, nor should we begrudge someone their perfectly sculpted abs and superawesome lighting if it fires us up and some how makes us want to be better too.

I also just read this story and while I was reading, I equally hated this woman for being older than me, faster than me, and more dedicated to a crazy goal than me while loving her for having the balls to do it in the first place.  When I read her "why", I thought, See.  I get that.  I get her why.  I get wanting accomplishment.  And I was inspired.

I often wonder if stalking people for the specific purpose of fueling your own inner fire is some strange form of self-bullying.  But then I remember some of the things I've learned about stoking that fire, and I think, stalk on.

Tim Grover's book Relentless is one of my all time favorite reads, especially when I'm feeling mediocre.  He talks a lot in this book about what motivates ultra-driven people- CLEANERS, as he labels them.  They clean up after everyone else.  They come in, they get the job done, they do what they have to do at all costs, and they are relentless.

If you're going to pursue some sort of greatness, you have to learn to be relentless.  Maybe that means getting up earlier, working later, dedicating yourself to your cause regardless of who's out there loving and hating you. Either way, don't be ashamed to stalk those who inspire you. Let what motivates you, motivate you.

Food is your Friend... Food is Fuel...

Me and food, we don't get along so well.

Well, some days we get along WAY too well.

This isn't the whole "let's talk about disordered eating" post.

Nor is it the "I'm going to share everything I eat with you" post.

Yesterday was the beginning of my quest, and one of the first things I am working on getting right in my brain is that my coach issued a Macro daily goal based on my activity, and I ain't gonna lie.  The amount of calories I'll be consuming if I am hitting these macros will be a good 500 to 600 calories more that I typically TRY to consume.

I've known it for a while, especially after St. George when I tried to get even leaner and even faster and really ended up more tired- I hardly ever eat enough food.  When I do consume enough (or more than enough) calories, they are generally empty, sugar-driven, soulless calories that are the result of red wine at the end of a long day or a stack of Chips Ahoy that didn't stand a chance.

There is no "cheat day" for me.  I either am eating clean and well, or I am on a downward spiral of pizza, wings and wine.  My brain doesn't see it any other way, I am either succeeding with my food choices or failing.  There is no happy medium.

I don't know why I'm wired this way, but if you know what I mean it's pretty irritating.  I enjoy food in the moment and generally harbor serious eaters remorse afterward.  If I'm being stringent and staying on a plan, I daydream about cupcakes and M&Ms.

Maybe other people don't have these issues, maybe it's just me.

Anyhoo, one of my first focuses this week is to have this mantra of "Food is Fuel".  I am not counting calories, I am USING macros. My body NEEDS this many macros in order to do what I am asking it to do.  I have to get used to that.  I will get used to that.

Ten Years in the Making

I'm not fast.

I'm not particularly athletically inclined.  In fact, sometimes the fact that I can stay on my own two feet is quite the accomplishment.

On March 25, 2007, I flew to Hong Kong with my sister-in-law and my son.  It was his birthday on the 30th, and he would be turning 8.  Having been a military brat, it was important to me that if I had the opportunity to let my kids experience the world, I would.

While there, we took several pictures.  I remember the air being heavy and humid, the city being tall and encroaching, the landscape foreign and beautiful.  I also remember thinking, as I looked at the pictures when we returned (this was SO before the era of smartphones, we had to take OLD FASHIONED digital pictures with an ACTUAL camera...) that I was awfully bloated.  That my skin looked pasty and I looked unhealthy, but it must have been the haze of the city, the crazy food I didn't want to eat... or the fact that we were basically at sea level and I somehow looked better at my hometown elevation of plus or minus 5,000 feet.

At the same time, my size 14s were getting tight and little did I know that the eighteen months that would follow the return of that trip would be the beginning of a season of my life that would challenge me in every way.  That's me on the left in 2007, in Hong Kong.

Sometime in 2009, I had a "come to Jesus" talk with the Man Upstairs on a drive home from work.  Everything about my life had become complicated and crazy all most too much for me to bear.  At the time I was working in Las Cruces, a 65 mile straight-shot through the desert commute from where I lived in Alamogordo.  On that drive, that day, I found myself thinking about how easy it would be to just floor the gas, yank the wheel to the right and hope I didn't survive.

Crazy thoughts of a desperate person...

Instead, I heard a small, firm voice telling me to put on some shoes and get out in the sun. I didn't even know if I had shoes suitable for exercise.  I dug around in my closet, found an old pair of Nikes I wore when I was pregnant and couldn't see my feet.

Six miles later, I had changed.

I jogged some.  I walked a lot.  I hurt, and was sore, and my son commented that my face was pale when I arrived home.  I thought I might pass out.

But I was changed.

For the first time in a really long time, I saw a glimmer of hope for something in the future.  What that something was, I didn't know yet.

I bought a treadmill.  I started losing weight.  I got frustrated when after months of "running" I could still barely run for 5 minutes without stopping to walk.  I felt defeated when I started paying attention to other people and what they could do, and would run with a friend who stoked my competitive fire by never looking back.  I vowed to some day be able to keep pace with her.  And then one day, I could.

My newfound hobby made room for lots of introspection.  I wanted to be strong.  I wanted to change my life, in all the ways that I could, for the better.

I joined a high-profile ladies' gym in my community and found that I wasn't the only one who felt the way I felt and faced the same challenges I faced.  Turns out, there's a lot of us.

One day, while running with a different friend (who's pace always challenged me, too) she asked me if I had ever heard of the Nike Women's Marathon.  She proceeded to tell me to the beat of our easy tempo about Tiffany necklaces as race medals, handed to you by SF Firefighters dressed in tuxedos.  And oh, a Girardelli chocolate mile....

I had never, ever considered that my body or my mind could survive a marathon.  That run took place in maybe November or December.  We decided to form a team and enter the lottery, and based on what I had researched I thought there was pretty much no way in hell we'd get picked, so I wasn't too worried about being kept on the hook to run a marathon.

I'll be damned, we got picked.

 We trained.  We ran.  And in the 5 hours and 50 minutes it took me to finish my 26.2, I ran through every emotion known to man.  At the end I was in pain. Lots of it.  But I knew immediately that this was something I would do again.  And maybe again.  And that the best version of myself would be the one who could conquer the run.

After that first race in October 2012, I ran the Little Rock Marathon.  5:40... not as good as I'd wanted but I felt better than the first time, stronger and more capable.  Progress.

It was after this marathon that I got my first meaningful tattoo-

"For those who hope in (wait on) the Lord will renew their strength.  They will mount up with wings like eagles.  They will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:31

That year, we returned to San Francisco for the Half Marathon, my husband joining me in my running by then.  We ran it together, but the half didn't quite satisfy.  He also had found that little voice inside that urges us all to see what we can do, and agreed to register for the Rock N Roll Phoenix full marathon with me.

This guy's heart is huge... he trained and sustained an IT Band injury that practically hobbled him... we slogged through the first ten miles of this marathon and walked the rest.  I hurt in places I had never hurt after a run before.  But we talked, met new people, bonded over the difficulty of endurance sports.  It was one of the best trips we've ever taken together.

In March, I was determined to run Little Rock again, and wanted to work on my endurance and time.  Little did I know that this race would challenge my belief in the run.  The weather turned bad, an ice storm covered the region, and I was called off the course by safety personnel at mile 18.  I had never been so uncomfortable in all my life, chugging along in freezing rain, my hands turning bright red and my body feeling numb from head to toe.  The theme was "Epic" and I was running behind this guy dressed in a speedo and a cape and little else, and I kept thinking, "As long as he's running, I'm running."  We made our way up Cavanaugh Hill and down through the neighborhood that had been the best part of the run the previous year, and were told the course was getting closed down.  I was satisfied that I had made it as far as I did and overall had a 12 minute mile pace even in those conditions.  My hubby ran the half at this race, and I think he finally realized that running marathons was going to be a thing for me.  Like really, a thing.

About a month later, this happened.

at 04:09:44

What got to me was this: If you wanted to kill as many people as possible, you would set off bombs during the start when people are in corrals.  But to set off bombs when people are finishing... when the emotions are at their peak, when the spectators and the runners alike are experiencing the epitome of the run...  there is not a word to describe how sinister that is.

I thought a lot about Boston that spring. I wasn't sure I'd ever be "elite" enough to qualify for Boston, but it was in the months after this happened that I started thinking that I really wanted to try. That making Boston, in my own way, is showing people who seek to destroy that the power to rise is still and will always be greater.  That my quest to qualify, even though it's not much, is my contribution to the running community that suffered such loss that day.  That if I could make Boston a goal, that running would have taken me from a suffering sad soul who used to be in denial about her health to a strong and victorious woman, capable of handling anything the world dishes out.  A woman who is not a victim of anything.

My husband joined my new beginning, even decided himself that he wanted to attempt a better run than what we'd experienced at Phoenix.  So we trained and got into the St. George lottery... and I'll be damned, we got picked.

I was in the best shape I've ever been in in my life, here.  My time (and current PR) here was 04:58.  I was doing great til I had some GI issues, a problem that had plagued me in all of my previous runs too.  Needless to say, I was on fire for my goal, progressing, getting leaner and faster.

And then everything changed.

Life was still going on, even with my goal in the background.  Changes and problems with my businesses became priorities, and I took an offer to move two states over, from New Mexico to Louisiana.  In the meantime, I still wanted to run.  My sister joined me in January of 2015 at the Phoenix RNR again.

I finished in 5:32:06.  The best thing about this try was that when I finished, I felt relatively good.  No where near as sore or fatigued as I had in past runs.  I also realized this meant that I had stopped pushing myself.  That even though I kept my goal out in front of me, I wasn't fully committed.

Even after six months in a new state, a big move in the middle of the summer that included uprooting two teenagers, and navigating new corporate management waters, I desired to find my way back to my goal.  Problem was, I was gaining weight, not running and OH MY GOD THE HUMIDITY.

All excuses aside, in August of last year, I reevaluated where I was at and what I wanted to do.  Again, with my sister, we took on the Dallas Marathon in December.  I wanted to get a feel for where I was at.  Having felt like I lost ground, I approached this marathon more like a social event and if I was honest, I'd say I felt out of shape enough that I was worried about surviving it.  I did.  In 6:04:32

Right after this one, it was only natural that I try Little Rock again.  To be honest, I was afraid of that race.  The bad weather in 2014 was something I really had no desire to experience again.  But my run in Dallas did what my runs do best for me- it provided perspective.  Little Rock would be my first real try again, my recommitment to my goal.  I would get it out in front of me, overcome the excuses that I had let linger for too long, and get on with it.

So right before I ran, I contacted a woman who, when I first met her, I felt like I'd known her a million years.  Her energy was contagious, her spirit too large to be contained in her body, her ferociousness something like watching a tiger on Planet Earth.  She's become a personal trainer and moved to Dallas, a measly 3 hours away from me.  I reached out to her and begged for her help.  We came up with a plan, and I committed to a full-on, no-holds-barred, kick-my-a$$ training plan to get me leaner and faster.  

I ran Little Rock for the third time this past Sunday.  It was, to date, the best run of my life.  Not because I PR'd (my time was 5:26:59) but because I found God again, the way I had on that very first run back in 2009.  I found a different version of myself.  I found my fire.  This is my quest.