From Love-Slog to Loving the Slog
From Love-Slog to Loving the Slog

Let me start by saying I love running. Truly, I do. It’s meditative, a great social activity, and consuming enough to help me forget about any little day-to-day annoyances. But if I’m being completely honest, I don’t have that standard, pure love for running. What I really have with this terribly fantastic sport would be best described as a love-slog relationship. All that warm and fuzzy acknowledgement that running is soooo amazing rarely hits me until after I’m done with the hard work. The way I’d describe running while on a leg-blasting hill or trying to keep up with someone who’s a bit more athletic than I am is much more colorful and peppered with profanity.

Cardio has never been my strong suit. Even easy runs leave me feeling full-body-exhausted and, often, like I’m about to throw up. So why endure the unpleasantness of running and not just stick to a quiet evening at home? Because in those beautiful moments immediately following a run, my mind clears, my stomach settles, and I feel a mix of complete calm and intense satisfaction at having just won the running battle. Because that moment of transcendence is fully worth the slog.

In a world where immediate gratification has become the norm, many of us seem to have forgotten what sacrifice is really about. We remember, all too well, it means enduring something unpleasant. We forget, though, that the whole point of sacrificing is to get at a reward greater than what we would have received by skipping that unpleasant piece completely. The crazy endorphins, that novel feeling of having used my own feet and power to move myself out of the city and into wild terrain, the knowledge that I am conditioning my body for a long, healthy life. Those things will always feel better to me than the minor joy I get from watching an episode of 30 Rock.

Which is why I’ve made a choice to learn to love the slog. When I’m at the point of increasing my daily distance and a cool down sounds great, I remind myself that an extra quarter of a mile will be done in a matter of minutes – anything can be endured for just a few minutes, right? In the middle of a hill, when I just want to call it quits, I don’t. I take a deep breath, slow down, and acknowledge that while it royally sucks in the moment, every step forward brings me closer to the top. And the top is where extreme pride in what I’ve just accomplished kicks in.

It’s a work in progress, for sure, but totally worth the effort. Whether in running, making healthy food choices, or deciding what to do with my free time, I’m making a point to embrace the slog. With reaching my goals at the forefront of my mind, I am sticking with the more challenging path. It’s tough, and it requires dedication, but the slog ultimately yields joy. The quick and easy choice? That typically just yields the status quo. Does that mean I never get to do anything frivolous again? Of course not. (I ain’t quittin’ you, Liz Lemon!) I know fun and quiet time are just as important to wellbeing as activity and productivity. But if a quick scan through the mental time log of the last week shows more time vegging out than being active, it’s a pretty sure bet that a quality slog with those running shoes is just what the doctor ordered.

 
 
Seen a lot of slim chicks posting their

workouts on here so I thought I'd join 

the fun
Warning : I will bully every one of you

into daily stretches, plyo drills, crazy 

intervals, lifting heavy weights and 

epic long runs
104 °F.....  As my Grandma says, 

"Marathon training ain't for p*ssies."



Crazy old lady is right.

New Featured eBibs

Warning... I'm exercising, eating right and watching my alcohol intake... Which means I'm sober, I'm cranky and I'm sore. So proceed with caution!
MONDAY.  Nothing a good pair of running shoes can't fix.
You know you're a runner when... you can run six miles nonstop and still feel out of shape.
Let's run a 5k this weekend then drink like it was a marathon.
People who eat loads of food and never gain weight, I hate you.
I think Facebook is broken... I put up a selfie from my run and no one "liked" it even though I refreshed it a few times.
I tried using actual booster rockets,  but race directors frowned on that.  Now I just use caffeine.
Oh, you get your caffeine through  drinking coffee? Must be nice to have  that much free time.
It's easy to give up caffeine.  I've done it a hundred times.
Me? I don't have trouble focusing.  In fact
I had a plain Greek yogurt this  morning, then a salad for lunch.  Then I came home and ate  the entire kitchen.
Entered what I ate today into my new fitness app and it just sent an ambulance to my house.
You know you're a runner when...  you see a sign on the highway telling  how many miles an exit is and  you think "I could run that!"
You used my Body Glide where?!?  Yeah, you go ahead and keep that.
You know who NEVER says "running  is really hard on your joints"?   People who actually run.
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