ratbastid

I'll tell you, the main muscle I'm developing in my half-marathon training is the muscle of honoring my promises to myself. I'm not terrible at keeping promises I make others, but this running thing is a promise I made myself, which is a category of thing that I regularly fail at.

I'm realizing that it's not my body or anything about me physically that has me go out there and run. It's ONLY a matter of whether I'm going to do what I said or not. And my thoughts about that are entirely beside the point.

Yesterday my plan called for three miles. All morning I thought, "That's ridiculous. I'm not going to run three miles today. Forget it. Maybe I'll do two." And then I put my shoes on and went out and ran three miles. Not because I thought it was a good idea, or because I felt like it, or even because I "should". I did it because I said I would. And when I ran past the intersection where I'd turn to take my two mile path, I thought hard about how much I was going to run, and all my thoughts were about how I felt, how tired I was, how I should really just run two miles. And then I kept going on my three mile track, because I said I would.

It's a little weird to call this "motivation" exactly. It's not like I pump myself up for anything. I'm not necessarily real pumped up at all. I'm just doing what I promised myself I'd do.