I didn’t sleep well lately. I was kept awake by my son, who has been waking up frequently for the past weeks. He’s growing three new teeth from what we can see. As any parent would tell you, growing teeth is an uncomfortable experience and a painful process for both the kid and parents.
In my mind, I was cooking up excuses for myself. Poor concentration? Blame it on the lack of sleep. Didn’t have energy to run? Blame it on insufficient rest.
But Monday is different – it’s my stipulated running day. It has always been the night where I run. Once weekly, I look forward to striding forward in the park. Why Monday? The start of the week is usually hectic and one of the best ways to decompress is running. Running empties my mind, just like writing. I love the feeling of running. As a foodie, running maintains my fitness and keeps my waistline from ballooning out of control.
I felt a strong urge to stay home and idle. To relax. To skip a day. In my mind, I was thinking to postpone the run. Tomorrow would be equally good. I could get a good night’s rest and tomorrow I’d have more energy. But things don’t always work this way. I could have another rough night of interrupted sleep. Tomorrow’s work could wear me down even more. If I tell myself I could cheat today, it implies I could cheat on other days and other things too. Small action leads to big consequence.
So, I decided to carry on running. My goal isn’t to run. My goal is to change into my running gear and get out of the house. By then, my subconscious would take over and I’d be pounding the pavement. By starting small, I’m not faced with running 2.4km. All I needed was to change and step out of the door.
And completed the run I did. It felt even sweeter.