The Mundane Beauty of Running

It's funny.

I have a friend who grew up playing high school sports.  She's a sprinter.  Competitive as hell.  She gets in, gets out, and gets the job done.

So, when I threw down the gauntlet and challenged her to run a half marathon with me, she laughed out loud in my face.  "Shit, what's the point?  All you're doing is just running and running and running and running.  I don't want to do something I love for 13.1 miles.  Nope, it's all you, Gering."

And the truth is, she's right.  After you've been doing it for a while, running gets mundane, rote, boring, same running shoes, same course, same breathing, same sweat.

So, the challenge is...how do you maintain the discipline to keep doing it and to keep stepping up the ante without having to run barefoot with a loin cloth in the outskirts of an African country to feel like you're pushing your body?

I know why I run.  I run because the endorphin rush afterwards is incomparable.  I run because it is the only waking hour of the day that I truly have to myself.  I run because it keeps my mind sharp and my heart beating.  I run because I can knowing that others can not. 

So, on the days when it's freaking 90 degrees and 60% humidity and I want to stab myself in the eye...I say, it may be boring, it may be mundane...but it's habitual for a reason because it's satisfying, it's enduring, it's a slice of me in the world (in a cute Lululemon skirt, of course) saying perseverance matters, even if just for this moment.