Motivation

I took a little break from running for a while. Now quite a month.

Because it was just so hot. (Ok, it wasn't really that hot, but it was hot enough and with no air conditioning in our apartment that meant as soon as I got hot I was guaranteed to stay hot the rest of the day. No matter what I did.)

And then I'd taken off so long it was hard to make myself get back out there. Inertia is a tricky, tricky beast.

Also, I knew I was going to be in serious pain when I did manage to make myself move again.

But I did it. One day last week I did a short run and you know what? I felt really good. My pace had only slowed a few seconds and my body seemed to feel stronger than ever.

Then I took two days off. For no good reason other than I just wanted to sit at home and read a book. So, for no good reason at all.

It's hard, this whole self motivation thing. I'm locked in a constant battle with my worst enemy, myself.

During one of those lazy days off I was perusing Facebook and came across something that rocked my lazy world.

I found the group for my ten year high school reunion. This fall.

Talk about a wake up call. It's like the universe said "Hey you! How's this for motivation?! Get up off your kiester and start moving! You haven't had a kid, so pregnancy weight is not a viable excuse!!!

Yeah. I hear you Universe.

You guys. Back in high school I was a twig. This is what I looked like my senior year:

See? Twig.

I was completely unhealthy. I was also obsessed with my weight and had a terrible body image. (One of the many reasons I stopped weighing myself on any kind of regular basis.) My last two years of high school I fluctuated between 90 and 95 pounds. But I still thought I could stand to lose some weight.

I guess you could attribute that to the fact that I was a teenager and there isn't a teenage girl on the planet that doesn't go through that at some point. But y'all, I was so thin there was a giant dent in the muscle of one of my thighs.

Plus I had an anxious stomach and any amount of stress completely destroyed my appetite. I was in the typical unhealthy teen relationship added to the usual daily suck of high school. My appetite was pretty much non existent.

And when I did decide I was hungry my favorite meal was a whopper with fries.

How did I ever make it to 28?

My weight has been under control for many years now, but I gained it in fat instead of in muscle. Don't get me wrong, fat is necessary and much preferable to the string bean that I once was, but too much isn't healthy.

And that's why I started running in the first place. To get myself in the physical shape I should have been in all along. And as 30 draws closer I know I need to do this for myself now. Because the longer I wait the harder it's going to be.

So it's with those things in mind that I'm back at it. When I run and all I really want to do is stop and have a milkshake I play these images over in my mind: 1) The non muscular stick I was as eighteen, 2) The non muscular, slightly flabby person I am now and 3)The toned, lean and HEALTHY woman I want to become.

And if that doesn't work I concentrate on the how the flab around my middle is jiggling with each step and I imagine that it's slowly melting away.

The goal is to be well on my way to that third image by the time my reunion rolls around.