I surrendered to an indoor run last weekend, on a treadmill, because humidity.
During the hour and forty-three minutes I was treading along, the lack of scenery made me acutely self-aware of the aches and pains of continual running, suddenly illuminated by having to stay in one spot.
I don't think the mind is made for stasis. Or static. There's something in the motion of running that triggers a need for progress. It's perhaps built into our DNA; how odd it feels to be running and getting nowhere - that feeling of perpetual stasis while in motion is enough to make anyone go crazy. Hence, it's an immense mental feat to run loops around a track, or miles upon a wheel.
I'm not quite sure how to articulate it, but I know that when I'm running, it's a relief to my sense of motivation: progress in some form is actively happening. Especially outside, the changing scenery is immediate evidence of the progress. But put a human in one place, and the DNA starts getting confused.
"Hey, we aren't going anywhere!'
"What's the point of you moving so fast right now? Nothing new is happening!"
"When are you going to feel like you're making progress?"
"You are wasting your life in one spot here."
Remember when we didn't have mileage on a treadmill? I suspect the manufacturers had to come up with some way to keep our DNA from jumping off the machine - hence the obsession with checking how far I've gone now that another 45 seconds have passed. It's infuriating, because the treadmill itself isn't like real road - the road does not, I can guarantee, roll out behind you. If anything, running outdoors compared to being on a treadmill is like trying to swim through a tar pit. It. Does. Not. Feel the same.
I competed in a road race yesterday, despite rain and wee morning hours. I hadn't run a whole bunch this week, and despite the "all-clear" from the pulmonologist, I wondered how my VO2 was going to hold up. I was less worried about my body, because after running long-distances for a while, you know that it's only a case of mind over matter. However, my mind still likes to make up excuses for the myriad of bodily aches that manifest after 45 minutes of tar pit wading:
"You're going too fast, you're gonna burn out before you hit 3 miles."
"We don't ever run this fast for this long, SLOW DOWN because I can't breathe."
"Your plantar fasciitis is acting up and you're going to have heel spurs if you don't walk right now."
"You realize you are not improving at all right now. You're simply headed for the medical tent."
Sometimes it doesn't matter about where you're running, the mind is still going to put up a fuss - and the only way to distract it is by proving it wrong.
Running through Central Park yesterday morning, as the rain drizzled down, I made one last mile-long effort to shuffle past 7 other runners in front of me. I don't know where the push came from, but something in my mind knew that, despite the pace, the rain, the aches and pains, I needed feel like I was making progress. So push I did, shortening my cadence, focusing intently on one back after another as I passed the other competitors, surely and consistently, and repeating to myself, over the din of my mind:
"Running is easy, running is easy, running is easy (no it's not) running is making me relaxed, relaxed, relaaaaaaaaaaaax."
"Do. Not Puke."
And then it was over, crossing the finish and letting my arms fly up to give my lungs some room to expand out to twice normal capacity in order to catch my breath.
Progress.
It can hurt, but it feels so good.
