I’ve been asked to speak at a wellness event!

• 3 • Motivation

I’ll announce details as the event approaches, but I’m excited to have been asked to give a 35 minute presentation at a wellness event! Here’s what one of the event organizers wrote when pitching the idea to me in an e-mail:

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I’m thrilled by her kind words and so excited to speak! Normally my public speaking is focused on food choices and the environment. I can’t wait for a chance to talk about fitness and motivation since they’ve been my passion and the focus of this blog for four years.

So. I’ll have 35 minutes.

How can I make the most of that time?

I’m looking through past posts and thinking about the most helpful topics as I work on a description for the event organizers.

Troubleshooting fitness roadblocks. Time management. Choosing appropriate goals. Being inspired and not intimidated by others. Habit formation. How to be comfortable with where you are in your fitness journey, but also believe in the power of the long game and being curious about where baby steps will get you.

I’m so excited for the chance to step back, look at my work over the years, and consolidate it into a 35 minute “So What?”

What have I learned?

I’ve done a lot in the past 5 years. I went from Couch to 5k to half marathons.  I’ve walked into over 20 fitness classes as a newbie and done my best. I’ve run races pushing a double jogging stroller and woken up at 5 a.m. to go for a 10 mile run. I’ve failed to meet time goals. Walked the last 4 miles of a half marathon I didn’t train properly for. Compared myself to faster friends. Learned to swim and completed two open water triathlons. Successfully formed habits and just as quickly lost them.

I’ve learned how to accept my position in the starting line. How to let go of a race I didn’t have time to train for. How to choose appropriate next steps and embrace the process more than the results.

Most of all, I’ve found joy in being active. My hope is that in 35 minutes I can share the best strategies for making fitness a joyful and regular part of life.

I want people to find the activity that makes their hearts sing and choose goals that make their hearts pound. I plan to share practical advice for making time for fitness, how to stay motivated, choosing appropriate fitness goals, finding an activity you love, and embracing the journey.

I couldn’t be more excited.

In the meantime, here are some old posts I’m finding inspirational as I plan.

I Am Not Special

Why Aren’t You Running? Troubleshooting Your Roadblocks

How Mindfulness Can Help with Goal Slip-Ups

The Best Running Goal I’ve Ever Had

Do Your Long-Term Goals Pass the “Then What?” Test?

Stay Motivated: Give Yourself Goal Windows

How to Embrace Being a Little Fish in a Big Pond

Lessons From a Triathlete: Karen Rand

I Stink – No Wait, I’m Awesome

If You’re Tired of Your Own Excuses Stop Making Them

Putting Psychology to Work: Motivate Your Running With Confirmation Bias

Running Bucket List

Thinking of Running Your First Marathon? Ask Yourself These Questions First

Have any favorite past posts or themes from the blog you think I should include? Let me know! I’d love to hear from you via e-mail or in comments below.

Motivate Yourself With Temptation Bundling

• 1 • Live Well, Motivation

Having trouble motivating yourself to go for a run, catch up on e-mails or fold that laundry?

Katherine Milkman, an associate professor at Wharton, has a possible solution: temptation bundling. Milkman found that people are more likely to stick with a task they sometimes avoid if it’s bundled together with something they really enjoy but only allow themselves to do when they’re completing the less enjoyable task. You can hear her explain the concept in her own words in the Freakonomics podcast episode When Willpower Isn’t Enough.

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Only do yoga while on the treadmill! Oh wait… no.

For example?

I’ve started listening to stand-up comedy only while I clean the kitchen. It’s the one household task I dread most. Listening to stand-up makes it more pleasant and also makes me less likely to procrastinate twenty times during the clean-up to check social media on my phone. (I’m excellent at prolonging unpleasant tasks with distraction. You too?)

What temptation bundling isn’t: Temptation bundling is not a reward system where you give yourself a reward after you complete a task. It’s the pairing of activities so they happen simultaneously.

For her research Milkman used the audiobook version of The Hunger Games to get people to exercise at the gym. They only had access to the audiobook while at the gym, and it worked.

“Initially, full and intermediate treatment participants visited the gym 51% and 29% more frequently, respectively, than control participants…” -quoted from research paper abstract

Temptation Bundling Ideas

  • Treat yourself to a latte, homemade vegan unicorn frappuccino, or smoothie to drink only during a long meeting
  • Pair a tv show, podcast or audiobook with a task you dislike
  • Visit a favorite coffee shop only when you’re catching up on e-mails

This could work with your children, too!

  • Download a game they can only play while you’re running on the treadmill at home
  • Have a special playlist with some favorite songs that’s the “clean up” playlist
  • Put together a special box of toys they only get to use on long car rides

Tips for Success

  • Think about your current frequency of the two items you’re bundling. If you currently get a smoothie daily, trying to save it for your weekly meeting might backfire.
  • Don’t cheat – if you choose a podcast to listen to while you’re running, choose a different podcast to listen to in the car.
  • Don’t ruin a favorite activity – if you truly love a glass of port once in a while, don’t make it conditional that you have to do something unpleasant while you drink it. Use temptation bundling to make your life better!

Similar Strategy: Activity Pairing

Temptation bundling reminds me a little of Gretchen Rubin’s suggestion about activity pairing, which I wrote about in my blog post about doing planks while my tea steeped. It’s more of a habit forming and time-saving strategy than a motivational one, and it can also be useful. Call your parents on your car ride home from work, do your foot stretches while you brush your teeth, etc.

Happy doing! If you have successful temptation bundling or activity pairings you love, I’d enjoy hearing about them in comments below!

 

I’m thinking of repeating Couch to 5k

• 5 • Motivation, My Running

One of my neighbors recently told me she was starting Couch to 5k again, and that she often does after a long break from running.

What a brilliant idea.

I’ve been swimming and taking a few classes at the gym (maybe you’ve heard) but not running much.

I can still run 3 miles at my slowest half marathon pace without stopping, but what if Couch to 5k could be used not just to get me comfortable running 3 miles, but to work into running them back at my old 5k pace… or better?

Couch to 5k is a walk/run program designed to slowly ramp up a non-runner into being able to run a 5k. It’s a great program because it’s so incremental. The first day has you alternate 60 seconds of jogging with 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes. That’s pretty doable.

I’m wondering what would happen if instead of jogging I ran my best 5k pace. Would I end the 8 week program able to maintain that pace for 3 miles?

More traditional training would be three quality running workouts a week, totaling between 10 and 15 miles the way I’ve done it in the past.

  • Track repeats
  • Tempo
  • Long run

 

But jumping into that type of training after a low mileage winter while recovering from plantar fasciitis sounds like a bad idea. It’d also make it harder to complete the swimming and biking workouts I need to ramp up for Tri for a Cure in July.

Couch to 5k takes 30 minutes, 3 days a week. It’s a cautious way to ramp up, yet I can make it more challenging by running faster intervals.

It’ll get me running 3 miles at a faster pace again, and it’ll be fun. You know I’m going to let myself feel like a badass for nailing that first day even though it’s no more than 60 seconds of running at a time. Because why not? I set a goal and I nailed it and I’m going somewhere. I’ve seen the training plan.

It’s not fun when you start running again after a break. Mileage and speeds that you remember being easy are suddenly hard.

It’s demoralizing to consistently attempt something out of your reach, and a lot of us runners do this every spring because we don’t realize how strong we were in the fall after running three seasons outdoors.

What if we intentionally undershot for the first couple weeks of spring running? We could choose running goals we know are well within our ability to reach. We can give ourselves time to warm up, ramp up, ease in.

Those of us who are recreational runners can afford to take a little extra time to ramp into the season and keep things enjoyable. It’ll reduce our risk of injury and keep us from dreading our runs.

Hope you create goals that are the perfect balance of challenging but doable and have a very satisfying spring running season!

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Me with the boys after completing Couch to 5k the first time in 2012. It was the beginning of a lifestyle transformation, but I had no idea at the time!

You can read my very first blog post about running describing my Couch to 5k experience in 2012 here: http://www.iamrunningthis.com/my-couch-to-5k-experience/

A little on the “J” word – Can we be nicer about jogging, please?

• 1 • Motivation, My Running

If you’d like to read some runner’s rants on the internet, search for “jogger”.

Being called a jogger when you identify as a runner can sting. It implies a lack of effort, which is infuriating when you’ve been running so hard that your lungs and calves are on fire. It implies you’re slow, which is infuriating when you’ve worked hard for that PR.

I get it. I even wrote a post in the early years of my running titled Why You’re a Real Runner.

However, I recently saw an article on Active.com by Caitlin Chock titled “8 Ways to Piss Off a Runner” that defined jogger in a way I didn’t like. Note: Caitlin Chock is an extremely accomplished runner who has earned her title; her words are reflective of a culture surrounding jogging that I’d like to see shift, a culture Caitlin isn’t responsible for creating. I hope I can reflect on this culture without implying that Caitlin is responsible, because it’s a funny article by a great runner.

jogger

Do I think passion and a need to run are part of what defines a runner? Sure.

But a jogger can feel that same desire. Some people need to go for a walk to feel themselves. And some people need to jog. A jogger is not someone defined by their resistance to the activity, but by their lack of desire to worry about speed.

The real difference between running and jogging? No one asks how fast you jog.

I would argue that for most of my long runs, I’m jogging instead of running. AND I LIKE IT.

This villainization of the word jogging has gone a little far. Runners considering the word an insult make it sound as though there’s something wrong with jogging. There isn’t; it’s wonderful to go out at an easy pace and not worry about doing intervals or hill repeats.

Sometimes when I’m in a conversation with someone and a friend introduces me as a “serious runner” because I run half marathons, I want to correct them and say I’m a jogger. Why? Because it feels like a false claim.

I’d feel more comfortable saying “enthusiastic jogger” because I haven’t done a track repeat since May, and I’m slower than I was two years ago… I just like to be outside pushing the stroller or listening to podcasts at a comfortable pace.

I think there should be a different term for what I do than for what Greg does.

But the word for what I do has become taboo.

Do I consider myself a runner?

I absolutely do. I consider myself a runner who sometimes jogs. Sometimes I get into a training cycle of track repeats and improve my pace, sometimes I just go out and enjoy myself.

It’s ok to jog

Being a runner and being proud to be a runner doesn’t mean we have to denigrate jogging.

A positive definition of runner doesn’t need to build itself on a negative contrast to jogger.

It’s great to be proud of the fact that you run hard and not easy, that you care about improving your pace, that you RUN. All out. Run.

Identify as a runner. Be proud. Own the title, you’ve earned it!

But maybe we could be careful about how we clarify what it means to be a runner, and not imply that there’s something wrong with jogging.

There isn’t.

“When you think you’re done, you’ve just begun!”

• 4 • Motivation

This was the sage advice Will chirped from the backseat this afternoon in a sing-songy voice, reiterating a recent lesson from kindergarten.

willbeach

Will went on in depth to explain the writing process for the books they’re working on in kindergarten, but the catchy little phrase stuck with me after.

So many times I’ve thought I was done when I was just beginning. Couch-to-5k is the most obvious example. I had no idea where I would end up, and I know it would make that 5k finisher so proud.

Reflecting on the times we thought we were through when we were just getting started usually gets us thinking about areas in our life where we’ve made the most progress. Progress we might not have dreamed of when we completed that first stage and thought we were through.

Take a moment to think about all the times you’ve accomplished something exciting, only to discover it was just the beginning.