‘YOU CAN EXPERIENCE A LIFETIME OF EMOTIONS IN ONE RUN’
running and i have been in an on-off relationship since my early teens. I always felt I was ‘bad’ at it (by which I mean I am slow, so slow that I have been overtaken by someone wearing jeans before) and lacked the willpower to get ‘good’. I am a consistently inconsistent runner – a couple of intense weeks on and then, plumped up on the self-satisfaction of my last aerobic burst, a couple of fallow months off.
Since March, however, I have fallen in love with my daily runs. As normal life ground to a halt, all I wanted was to move. I was sad, I was bored, I was desperate to be outside. The endorphins couldn’t hurt.
Over the years, I had been told repeatedly – by people smarter and, yes, faster than me – that running is good for your head. And while I had experienced this to be true, it wasn’t enough to consistently motivate me. Who cares? I used to think. I just want lean thighs and a tight butt! Well, suddenly, I did care.
My father is 70 and runs every day. Whenever we run together, he outpaces me with an ease that’s embarrassing for both of us. He has always told me that you can experience a lifetime of emotions in one run. I know what he means now. Life’s gigantic, sweeping story arcs can be contained into a single jog like perfect Russian dolls.
There are the people who sprint past you with ease, only to stop moments later. There are the hills you fear, but which you haul yourself up, triumphant and invigorated. There is the sharp stab of a stitch followed by the feeling that you could keep going forever. There are the unexpected turns you take and stumble across a view that, if your breath wasn’t already yanked out of you, would take it away. There is your astonishing capacity to keep on going. Your jog is a fertile track for metaphors.
My daily runs, at 6.30am around Hampstead and through Regent’s Park, are my most precious hour of the day. It is my time, to think about everything and nothing. I feel my tight mind loosen, problems unravel, solutions arise. In the past few weeks I have learned not to try and outrun the pain, but go with it.
The physicality of running is mentally liberating. For me, it is meditative.
You burn, you pant, you sweat, there is something empowering about allowing yourself to see what your body can do, to surrender to the beautiful simplicity of putting one foot in front of the other.
It is when I run that I feel my head still.
‘IT’S MY TIME TO THINK. PROBLEMS UNRAVEL, SOLUTIONS ARISE’