What makes me happy? Oh, man, lots of things.
I went for a run today. Just the fact that I can run at all, that I run on a regular basis and that I’ve been doing it for more than 8 years now is amazing to me. 15 years ago I would joke that I wouldn’t even run to get out the way of an oncoming train. I was heavy and I would walk lots of places but I never moved quickly. Running changed all that. And today, it was reasonably cool, a little bit of sun peeking out of the clouds, and I wasn’t too hungry or too full. I set a goal of just going out and covering 6 or so miles, and not to worry about how quickly I was doing it. I planned a route that included a bunch of hills, because next weekend I’m running in the Bridge To Brews 10K and it includes a Hell of a hill: the Fremont Bridge. I want to feel good about running in that race; I’ll be running with Ken and Chaz so there’s social pressure.
Running is about taking care of myself, about being active and fighting off the effects of too many donuts and all the health problems that come from that. That contributes to my happiness.
Running is also about planning, both small-scale (planning out when and where I’m going to run, and what pace I need to hit, and making time for running) and larger-scale (training for a better pace and a lower weight, being good to future Brian by gifting him a better working body than he might otherwise have). Planning things and seeing the plans take shape and working through or around obstacles that come up all contribute to my happiness, too.
Running is about “just keep going” and “showing up”. I made it out the door today. Sure, the weather was nearly perfect, and I’m injury-free at the moment, but bottom line is, I decided I was going to run today for 6 miles and that’s what I did. And when I was out there and just passed the one mile mark, when the negative voice in my head started telling me how much farther I had left to go, I didn’t listen. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other. That is a huge lesson that I’ve learned and it contributes to my happiness, too; every time I fall down, I know that I have it in me to get back up again.
After the run, I showered off and got dressed and went out to grab a delicious dinner from one of the many great restaurants in my neighborhood. Rewarding myself after achieving a goal contributes to my happiness, too.
It might seem that this post is better suited for the R in my alphabetical blog post series, but honestly, it’s more about my happiness than about running. I can only hope that I transfer the skills I learned from exercise to other areas of my life. I try, at any rate.
