1470: Move

Well, I did it; a little later than intended due to an all-round shitty week last week, but did it nonetheless: I got up early and battled through my own sense of inadequacy to have a very slow run, kicking off yet another attempt at the Couch to 5K program.

My trouble with getting up, out and exercising at the moment is the fear that it’s going to be difficult and painful. The rational response to this is “well, of course it is” but the irrational side of me uses that as a reason to want to put it off. I’m not sure why, though, because putting it off for longer is just going to make it more difficult and painful in the long run, which will just make me feel worse, which is ultimately somewhat counter-productive, to say the least.

What I’ve found I need to do in the past is try not to worry about what other people think of me, and try not to compare myself to others. I am woefully unfit and rather overweight, so of course I’m not going to be able to run as well as that guy with the frighteningly muscular legs who just overtook me. It’s hard not to compare and want to push yourself, though — but in my current physical condition, pushing myself too hard just makes me want to stop completely which, again, is ultimately somewhat counter-productive.

What I generally try to do is to blot out the outside world as much as possible. When it’s crappy weather like this, I put on my hoodie and put the hood up, and put some loud music on to encourage me to give it my best. Today I had on my “Gym Battles” playlist from the last time I had a half-hearted fitness drive, which includes a selection of anime themes plus battle music from a variety of RPGs — all of which make fantastic exercise music, I might add. The soundtrack to Split/Second also makes for brilliant running music, so I can highly recommend that if you have a copy.

Now I’m back and about to have breakfast, and my legs are aching. I’m sure they’re going to hurt even more later and tomorrow, but that’s an oddly satisfying feeling — it’s physical evidence that you’ve worked hard and done something positive. So long as it doesn’t continue aching for too long, that is!

I’m going to try and support the occasional running with some Wii Fit. I don’t want to set myself too ambitious goals so I get disheartened and don’t stick to them, but at the same time I also don’t want to waste my time. I’ll have to experiment a bit and see what works for me in the long run.

For now let’s hope I can keep this up for a while at least.