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by Michael Selman It has been said that runners have their best thoughts of the day while out running. Runner and writer Michael Selman shares his "Thoughts on Running" with us here at ontherunevents.com.
On this morning’s run, I did something I have never done before, in all my years of running. I left the house for my run without putting on my watch. Intentionally. It felt strange, but it was wonderful. and it was a new beginning. I’ve been struggling with my running now for over a year, and with the issues of why we run for even longer. Granted, everyone has their own reasons, but the one thing that seems to come up time and time again is the issue of control. I’ve touched on this subject before, but today, I am attaching it, and hope for your responses and thoughts as well. Control. In a life so full of twists and turns, responsibilities and commitments, not only do we seem to lose control, but sometimes, we even seem to lose sight of the possibility of ever having it again. How often do we find ourselves in situations where we feel like cattle, being herded in every direction by other people, or things. Ah, but then there is our running. Our time. Something we have complete control of. Or is it? Let’s look at what we do to gain control. For me, it starts with setting my alarm for 4:45 AM. It’s my choice. I like morning running. I like it a lot. Enough to get up that early to do it. But in a way, the time is controling me. If I controlled when I did things, I would sleep later, and run when I wanted to. Can’t do it though. Gotta work around things. A job. The heat. Life. What else do we do in the name of control? We slip on that watch with the black band which measures what we do to the 1/100 of a second. We wrap that heart rate monitor around our moist torsos so we can keep track of our beats per minute, so we know if we are working out to our maximum benefit. We watch the weather channel, or look at our themometer before we go out, and it may influence the way we run. Then, in the name of control, we do 880’s on the track, or run 10 miles at an 8 minute pace, because that’s what our schedules say that’s what we have to do. Sometimes, the “control” we have seems more precisioned than a hospital operating room. So, today, I gave up some control to gain a different kind. No Pulsar around my ribs. No Casio around my wrist. No pre-detirmined distance around the neighborhood. And no noose around my neck. I’ll admit it wasn’t easy. At every checkpoint, where I usually get my split time, I was pressing flesh, and it made me laugh. As I was running, in the back of my mind, there was always a little voice wondering what my pace was, how long it was going to take, and wishing I could document it. Even at the end, I automatically looked for my watch, and, instead saw a tan line. But I’ll run without a watch again next time. And the time after that. I’ll do it that way until it becomes habit. This new control will take some getting used to. In the past a lot of my running goals have been either time or distance oriented. I needed my watch, and I needed to know how far how fast. I may go there again some day, but for now, I don’t need a heart rate monitor to tell me about my heart. Biofeedback tells me my heart is just fine. I don’t need a watch to tell me about my time, because I know my time running was good. What I need is to have control, not be a slave to it. To that end, my goal is to break running down to it’s simplest element. Putting one foot in front of the other, and running.
Thanks Michael for sharing your "Thoughts on Running" with us here at
ontherunevents.com
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