I haven’t posted again since my first post because I was in a kind of bad place motivation wise. See, I am not to most optimistic girl on the block, and I had a HUGE goal race this past weekend. One that would determine my running course for the rest of the year. And I had little confidence I would make it and was letting that self doubt affect everything else in my life. Long story short – I needed to hit a 10K time of or below 58:13 to qualify for a race team that I’ve really really been wanting to make. And this was it, last chance. Plus the last qualification timing I missed by 7 seconds. 7!!!
Long story short… after all the doubt, up to and including a mini breakdown at the start line where a friend let me cry on her shoulder, I did it. I ran it in 56:49. I’d like to say I had a dig deep moment and convinced myself I could do it and that fueled me, but the truth is, on the course even I was so convinced I’d miss the mark I actually stopped on one hill for a few seconds and sobbed a little before forcing myself to keep going. That little negative voice inside is my weakness, but being stubborn keeps it a bit at bay – I know this about myself and will struggle with it forever I think.
So how about you? What do you do when it seems like you’ll fail? At one point I joked that I refused to miss the mark by seconds again, that instead, I’d lay down flat on the road when it was obvious I wouldn’t make it, and just be done then and there. Luckily my stubbornness won out in the end this time. This time…