This Monday I decided to start up a "Couch to 5k" training program again. I had never been a runner, or much of an athlete at all, but a few years ago a group of girls in my ward were going to do the program and I decided to join in. Basically it's a really slow build up, so that at the end of eight weeks, you are able to run a 5k (3 miles). So for example, for the whole first week, you run for 60 seconds, then walk for 90 seconds, and do that for a total of 20 minutes.
Like I said, it's a slow build up.
I was eventually able to run three miles, for the first time in my life, and built all the way up to 5 miles. Then I tried trail running and ended up with a stress fracture... and then I got engaged and then married and then pregnant and had a baby and then got pregnant again and had a baby again and now I'm finally ready to get back to running.
I've been thinking back to the last time I did this program, and I remember in those first few weeks, when I would hit the point of difficulty in the run- the point where you start to sweat and your breathing gets more labored you can feel your body start to work hard- and I would think to myself "I can't wait until I get to the point that it becomes easy to run this far".
As I progressed through the program and got stronger and could run farther, I started to notice that the point of difficulty never changed, the only thing that changed was how long I could keep going once it got difficult.
I can't help but think that I need to apply this principle to the other "points of difficulty" in my life. It's tempting to think that one day I'll be so good at being with children all day that motherhood will be easier. A part of me is expecting that someday what is hard now, will become easy. I'm sure that will happen for some things (and has already happened with a few things), but I think that the real purpose of life is more about becoming strong enough to preserver through the difficult things, than becoming so good that life becomes easy.
Something else I noticed as I got better at running, was how much came to really enjoy sweating. Not that being sweaty was wonderful, but sweating was my evidence that my body was working hard. And there's something invigorating about knowing that you are pushing yourself like that.
As I write this I'm thinking of those points of "sweating" that I reach as a mother, and how I've been looking at them as evidence of my own weakness. I'm going to work on instead seeing them as evidence that I am working hard, and rather than giving into the urge to quit when things get hard, focus on gradually increasing my ability to persist through the difficulty.Labels: Exercise, Faith, Motherhood, Personal Growth