Motivation is a runner’s best friend, and also worst enemy. When motivation is high, running is phenomenal. When motivation is low, there is nothing but time it seems until that motivation returns. It would seem obvious at this point (being as my last blog post in June was a missed marathon race) that my motivation has been on the down and outs in the last couple of months. When I moved to Omaha for graduate school, I was excited for a change, but not in my running. I am slowly realizing that I had taken San Diego for granted and the complaints about city running, the asphault, the hills are all very much missed as I struggle to do 30 minute runs.
Some of this lack of motivation I attribute to the fact that Omaha doesn’t know me as the runner (yes, those countless runner jokes and nicknames at eVisibility are highly missed). To most people I meet out here, I am the quiet English student, the California girl, or the distant cousin however many times removed. If no one expects me to run, of no one expects me to be the motivator, then doggone it, I ain’t gonna run. And at times, I do that. Instead of going one or two days without running before going crazy, I struggle to run every 3 or 4 days.
Until this week; and this is my challenge more than my motivation. I have designed a calendar upon which I have color-coded my runs. Any run lower than a certain time or number of miles will be colored red; anything over a certain goal will be green, and something in between will be orange. Thus, taking advantage of the last days of Fall, I will bring those colors to my running calendar.
*As my motivation increases, I hope also that my blog posts do as well. There is so much to write about in my experience in Omaha; it’s a shame for anyone to miss it (especially myself).