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With all the “what went wrong” and “what could I have done” and “what will I do” posts over the last two weeks, I was told in passing by my friend Brendan that I was analyzing my Boston Marathon race to death. The tone in his comment was not critical or even one of “hey, earth calling Luau” – it was simply matter of fact.
And he’s right.
Inadvertently, he reminded me that the running is not necessarily about the race or the analysis, but rather, it is about The Joy!
The benefits of the Runner’s High are well documented. So are the health benefits one gets from running; as are the psychological ones; and to a lesser degree, the intellectual ones.
What Brendan reminded me of is the joy of simply being active. All of the benefits mentioned above come after a certain amount of time on your feet. To achieve them, you have to work – sometimes a little, sometimes a lot.
The Joy however is that feeling you get while you’re slipping on your shorts and then into your shoes, and then finally as you are stepping out the door. That anticipation of movement, of sweat, of earned endorphins, of that feeling of “spentness”
I love that feeling – that sense of joy, that sense of knowing you are about to bring the pain and it is going to hurt so good.
I haven’t forgotten the Joy while I have been dissecting my 2011 Boston. In fact, the Joy has been, in part, what has kept me sane, allowing me to continue to have the desire to run despite the disappointment and analysis.
Well, after Brendan’s comment, the analysis is done, the disappointment is harnessed.
Yes, it is back to training; yes it’s back to numbers – The Around the Lake Marathon is less than 12 weeks away. But this cycle is going to be about The Joy!
Run Luau Run 
Thank-you Brendan, Luau needed to hear this.
Thanks Brendan.
Luau – extra points for using the most interesting man in the world. =)
I need this imprinted upon my brain, or tattooed across my forehead and inside my eyelids.
For as much as I claim to not have bad days running the bad days I have certainly cloud over my training. I think my cross-training suffers more than running, but running is not as free and loose as if I moved with joy.
Thanks to Brendan for keeping it simple for you. Thanks to you for fleshing it out. Run happy my friend.
Once I let go of the drive to set PR’s and focusing on time and just getting out and enjoying the fact I CAN run (which is a miracle considering the diagnosis), everything flows so much more easily. Thanks for sharing The Joy!
I don’t know how I missed this post. I feel like it was directed partially at me. This, in fact, is EXACTLY what went wrong with my Boston Marathon. But, I found it didn’t go wrong DURING the race, it went wrong LONG before that. Somewhere along the line during my training I let the JOY get completely sucked-out of my training. It took my wife to point this out to me. I’m getting back to what I love doing. Running for the pure fun of it. Running without focusing on the numbers. I’m even ditching my HR monitor and foot pod for most of my runs. I’ve already reprogrammed my Garmin display to only show me Time and Distance…
So far it is going well. Run happy!