Posted on October 4, 2013

Recently I’ve been trying – trying – to get into running. Properly, not just jogging a little bit here and there, which I usually end up doing…

It strikes me as one of the physical activities that comes most naturally from a human perspective, and I’ve read enough blogs about people taking up running, and positively gushing about how addictive it is and how it’s changed their life, etc.

I’d genuinely like to get in on that, if possible. I want to find a form of exercise that I enjoy and that is relatively affordable and provides an outlet for stresses of the more mental variety, which I could really use. Plus, I actually do voluntary stuff for a fitness website, so I’m coming into ever-increasing virtual contact with people who have found that spark, either recently or a long time ago, and appear to have found their calling.

I even joined a running group in the hope that I would catch on too. I imagined myself as a writer who runs, or a runner who writes, something akin to Haruki Murakami, or Matthew Inman of The Oatmeal website, or an ordinary vegan fitness junkie, like the people on the aforementioned fitness website. I could be one of those!

But it’s just not happening.

I don’t know why it’s turning out this way, but every time I step out the door ready for a run, (if I even get that far in the first place), a wave of what I can only describe as cringe engulfs me. The cringe results in thoughts popping into my mind which discourage me from running right from the get-go; I’ll not even be able to run that far without having to *shame* slow down to walking, right in front of everyone; I look like an utter moron (even though lots of other people are doing it I am the only one whom the spotlight of moron shines down upon, goes my thinking); I have no business being out here; TURN BACK AND GO HOME…

In the safe realms of my imagine I am running, sprinting, skipping, free. But in reality I am a shrivelling ball of cringe who cannot think its way out of this state and just get the hell on with running.

Everyone else is doing it so why can’t I?

The only solution I can think of to get out of this cycle is to locate a “way in”. I will keep a close eye on the “world of running”, and one day I will spot a space in a group, which I will sneak into as stealthily as I can, and at least I’ll simply be blending in.

Then I can focus on the more serious business of running for fun.