Living well is about variety, learning new things and setting challenges that require you to move out of your comfort zone from time to time. Over this summer (2018) I have been following the NHS ‘Couch to 5K’ running plan. I’ve attempted it a couple of times before but this time I got to the very end. It has been an uphill challenge in many ways as I’m not what you would call one of life’s natural runners, if indeed they exist. I’ve always thought they did and have never placed myself in that camp, however, they are more likely to be people who have gone out and done it, practised and kept doing.
The plan takes you through nine weeks of gradually increasing your running time until you are running for 30 minutes which I’m rather pleased to say I can now do quite happily. In fact what was once REALLY hard work is now rather enjoyable, and the feeling I get when I’m done is fantastic. It just goes to show how sticking at something really hard and tackling it one step at a time (quite literally in this case) really works.
Living in the beautiful city of Bath of course means there is very little flat ground so these runs have been made more challenging because of the inevitable hills. Our local park is at the top of a steep hill that I walk up but once reached, the path undulates in a way that makes running around it quite demanding. Another favourite place of mine is our local cycle path which has been created along an old railway track. That involves a fair share of uphill tests as well.
I was contemplating this on my run this morning – these sessions provide a great space for thinking. This experience is a good metaphor for life. There are downhill fairly easy bits, flat sections that you coast along and then the uphill challenges we all face from time to time. It’s actually only on completion of those demanding sections that you get a real sense of achievement, a buzz of feelgood chemicals. As it happens, at this time of the year, the sun is at such an angle in the sky that when I reach the top of each incline, just as I come to the crest, there is the sun facing me as my reward. So in addition to that feeling of achievement I’m getting that extra input of sunshine energy that keeps me going to the next challenge.
At my designated end point on the path there is also a convenient bench that sits in the sunshine on the crest of one of the longest inclines. It’s the perfect place to sit for a few minutes’ meditation whilst I slow my breath and allow myself a moment to ‘stop’ to celebrate my achievement. As you can see from the image I am in good company, flanked by ironwork ‘statues’ of a Roman Centurion, Harry Patch and Amy Williams.
The Roman Centurion represents Bath’s history as a Roman spa. Known as ‘Aquae Sulis’ Bath was first established in AD60s when baths and a temple were built around a natural hot spring. Harry Patch is famous for being the ‘last Fighting Tommy’. Born in Bath in 1898, he fought at the Battle of Passchendale before being invalided back to England in 1917. He died aged 111 in 2009. One of my favourite walks takes us through a village cemetery where he is buried and I always say hello. Amy Williams is a skeleton bob racer and was based at Bath University when Team GB won their first Gold medal in the Vancouver Winter Olympics 2010. Her winning ‘slide’ was the decider.
Over the last couple of years, I’ve been running a wellbeing programme for people living with ongoing pain. In it we talk about tasks / activities being like hills that we take step-by-step. Some are gentle inclines whereas others are mountains to climb. I like the idea of taking my sunny running experience into other parts of my life. What gets me out of the house is imagining that wonderful feeling I get when I reach the top. Imagining the way you feel when you achieve a task that has required some effort. Neuroscience backs this up. The brain has a circuit called the Reward System. It fires off when you are successful at a task that requires some effort and rewards you with a boost of feelgood, pain relieving motivating chemicals. The trick is to set your tasks at a level that requires effort but that you know you can succeed at if you try hard enough. It is important to do this on a regular basis to keep this system healthy – use it or lose it.
If you find that that little inner critical voice is telling you you can’t, just think of that reward and the feeling you’ll get when you reach the top of your mountain. If the distance between A and B seems too hard, break it down into achievable bites then go out there, do and keep doing. Then take a moment to stop to reflect and celebrate your achievement.
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