Ep #138: It’s Time to Get Your Ass Back to Running

Now that we’re a couple weeks into social distancing and maybe you’re starting to get the hang of how to get on a Zoom call and not get caught walking into the bathroom and dropping your pants on video in front of all your coworkers. That poor woman, I can’t believe that happened to her.

Welcome to The Not Your Average Runner Podcast. If you’re a woman who has never felt athletic but you still dream about becoming a runner, you are in the right place. I’m Jill Angie, a certified running and life coach and I teach women how to start running, feel confident, and change their lives, and now I want to help you.

Well rebels, we are in the thick of it now, aren’t we? Still in lockdown, doing our best to flatten the curve and put an end to this pandemic as quickly as possible. And one of the themes that is coming up a lot this week in Run Your Best Life is feeling completely unmotivated to run right now.

And also, feeling overwhelmed, stressed, and worried just in general. Lots of people are reporting in that they believe they’re failing at working from home, or failing at homeschooling their kids, and that somehow, despite not having to get up and commute to work, somehow, they have less time than before.

So I know there are a lot of you that can relate, that right now, you’re listening thinking, “Hell yeah, that’s me.” So you, for sure, are not the only one experiencing these feelings right now. And honestly, I’m pretty sure every mom is going through something similar. And even if you don’t have kids at home, if you’re making that transition from working in an office to working at home, possibly with your spouse around too, there is a lot to adjust to.

Or maybe you just got laid off or you got furloughed. And now you’re at home with quite literally nothing to do, no expectations, and you’re like, “What the fuck am I supposed to do now?” So it makes a lot of sense that you would be feeling overwhelmed right now, and just generally kind of meh about running.

Your races might have been canceled, your daily routine is different than it was a couple weeks ago, you might be working around kids who want your attention, even if you’re in the middle of a Zoom call with your boss. You’re just not sure if it’s even safe to be outside right now. There’s a lot of discussion about that.

And it just sometimes seems like a much better idea to spend what little free time you have with Netflix, on the TV, with a glass of wine by your side. And you know what, if that’s what you want to do right now, just please go for it. 100%. Don’t judge yourself. Just own it, say this is the choice I’m making, and this is how I’m coping with it.

We’re going to be riding out this pandemic for at least another month or two, and so I completely understand if your first instinct is watching Tiger King with a bottle of Prosecco. Honestly, it was my first instinct as well. But here is the thing my friend; that’s going to get old really fast. And binge-watching TV really doesn’t feel great after a while.

You actually end up feeling more tired. Just like, lethargic and achy and creaky. That feeling when you stand up and you’re like the tin man. And honestly, at least I do, I feel kind of gross after I have been watching TV for just hours on end. You know that feeling, right?

And it’s kind of annoying and weird because you look forward to the weekend or you look forward to your day off so you can just sit on the couch and not do anything all day long. And then you actually do it, and sometimes it’s just not nearly as awesome as you imagined.

And here is why that is; because human bodies were designed to move. And when we don’t move, it impacts our brains, our nervous systems, our immune system, our digestive system, our muscles, it just impacts everything. So now that we’re a couple weeks into social distancing and maybe you’re starting to get the hang of how to get on a Zoom call and not get caught walking into the bathroom and dropping your pants on video in front of all your coworkers. That poor woman, I can’t believe that happened to her.

And remembering to wash your hands several times a day while you’re not touching your face all the time, now that you’re figuring out homeschooling, your kids are settling into a new routine, you guys, it is time. It is time to get your ass back to running.

Now, I know you think the reason that you’re not running is because this pandemic is just overwhelming, that you’re like, I’ll be motivated to get going again once I can go back to going to all my favorite places, back to the gym, get my old routine back, my running buddies.

But let’s tell the truth here. The reason you don’t feel motivated to run right now is not because you have been told to stay home. It’s because you are telling yourself things that make you feel unmotivated. Things like, “Why should I even bother? My race was canceled.” Or, “I am way too stressed to take time out for running right now.” Or, “I’m just too tired to go for a run.”

You’ve said these things to yourself, right? I know you have. So please stop telling yourself that stuff, mama. Stop it. First of all, it’s just lies. You’re not actually too tired to run. Running gives you energy. You know this. You know when you get your shoes on and get that first half mile under your belt, you will feel so much better. You are really not too tired.

And you’re also not too stressed because once again, you know that running helps you manage your stress. So stop being silly. Just stop it. It is possible, it is likely that your body – part of the reason your body is feeling so stressed is because you’re not running. Really think about it.

Running has an impact on your nervous system. So if you are feeling stressed, one of the easiest ways to help reduce that stress is to put your shoes on and go out for a run. Okay, well I can hear you saying some other things now, I have some sort of extra sensory hearing right now.

You’re saying, “Oh, but why bother? I haven’t run in two weeks, I’ve lost so much fitness, running is going to be so hard.” My friend, even if that is true, putting it off for another day or another week or another month will absolutely not make it easier. The more time you take off, the more effort you’re going to need to muster to go running when you go back to it. So let’s just put a stop to that right here and now, and get back into movement.

Now, I know that you are judging yourself a little, maybe a lot right now, for letting go of your routine over the past couple weeks. So let’s let go of the judgment. You have had a lot to manage since we were all told to stay home. Whether you are working from home now and homeschooling your kids, or maybe you’re still going to work because you’re essential and might even have unexpected childcare to arrange around that because your kids aren’t at school, it’s all kind of turned upside down.

Or maybe you’re sheltering in place and you live alone, and you’re like, “I’m bored and lonely and I really wish I had the option to have another human in my house right now to annoy the fuck out of me.” Whatever it is, you’ve got a new set of circumstances, we all have that, so I want you to just kind of let go of the judgment.

You’ve spent the past couple weeks figuring out how you’re going to deal with this. You’re trying different things, thinking a lot of different thoughts that are creating a lot of emotions, and now it’s time to start thinking on purpose.

So you have a new set of circumstances and what you decide to think about them is going to determine everything. So I urge you to get active. I mean, highly urge you to start running again. If you don’t want to start running again, that’s fine. Get out there and go for a walk every day.

Get outside, get some sunshine on your face. Now, if your neighborhood is super crowded, you don’t feel comfortable because there are lots of people on your sidewalk and they’re all within your six-foot buffer zone, get in your car and drive somewhere where the people are not.

There are still places like that. Or just get busy in your backyard running laps or walking laps, or you know what, if you don’t have access to any of those places, and I know there’s people out there that don’t have a backyard and maybe they live in New York City and it’s really hard to get six feet from anybody in New York City, run in place in your living room.

I’m serious about this. A French man in quarantine ran a marathon on his fucking balcony a few weeks ago. His balcony. Google it. It was 21 feet long. Do you know how short that is when you’re running? It’s not a very long balcony. It took him a little over eight hours. He just went back and forth and back and forth.

So if he can do that, you can 30 minutes of run-walk intervals in front of your couch. Just move your body, whether it is running or walking or riding your bike. Please get up and move. It will help your mind. It will boost your immune system. It is something fun you can do with your kiddos. Hell, it is just something to do that’s not sitting on the couch watching Netflix or scrolling through social media.

And that brings me to another point. You guys, you got to turn off the social media and turn off the news. If you’re scrolling through social media right now just looking for information about the pandemic, and maybe looking for people who are not doing it right, and getting pissed off because they’re not doing it right, you got to stop.

Because first of all, those people that are two states over that are not doing it right, you can’t change their behavior. All you can do is stop scrolling, stop searching coronavirus updates and how many cases are there in New York City right now because you cannot fix any of that. And there is nothing there that you need to know right now. Absolutely nothing.

If something important happens, I am fairly certain that you will find out about it. Remember the days way back when, years and year ago when we didn’t have Facebook and we didn’t have Twitter to tell us everything that was happening, like, minute by minute? The days before 24-hour news channels?

Was there every anything important that happened back then that you missed? No. There was not. I am pretty sure you heard about all the important news events without 24-hour news, without Facebook, without Twitter, without all of that. So you can take a break for 30 minutes and go for a run instead.

Or stay in for a run if you want. Whatever it is. Just get moving. It’s going to make all of this so much easier. Getting out for a run, getting yourself off of the newsfeed and the social media feed gives your brain a break, getting out for a run gets your legs moving and it’s good for your body.

Please, please, just get moving. And here is one last piece of tough love for this episode. Now, you can treat the next couple of months like a very long extended snow day. And think how you feel after a couple of snow days. You’re hibernating in your pajamas, you’re seeking as much comfort as possible, there’s probably a lot of mimosas.

Or you can decide that the next couple of months is your time to rise up, to get to work, to see exactly what you are capable of. So what if right now, right this minute, you decided you were going to become stronger and fitter and faster during this lockdown? How fun would that be?

And you know what, you don’t need a treadmill for that. You don’t need miles and miles of trails. You can do this with what you have at your fingertips. You can look up free strength training workouts. I mean, the Peloton app is free for the next 90 days.

There are no excuses right now to get in the way of you deciding hey, I’m going to use the next two months or however long this lockdown lasts, to really work on myself, to work on my fitness, to work on my mental fitness and my physical fitness. How fun would that be? To show up after the lockdown and be like, look what I just did with the past two months.

And it’s totally possible. You just have to decide right now how you’re going to show up for yourself for the next several weeks. Is it a snow day or is it a training day? It is all your choice. Now, if you’re going to choose training day, make sure you gather all your resources. Like primarily, for runners, the Rebel Runner Roadmap is really going to make a difference for you, and it opens for enrollment on Monday, April 6th.

It’s a 30-day online program that will help you start running, get yourself ready to start training for a 5K this summer, and this is the perfect time to do it. You know this. What else have you got going on? Your gym is closed. This is the time to go all in and focus on running.

This lockdown is going to be transformational for everyone on this planet. There is no doubt in my mind. You just need to decide what your transformation is going to be. Are you going to be a runner when it’s all over? Yeah, okay, then you’re going to want to join the Rebel Runner Roadmap now to make that happen.

So I want you to check out all the details at rebelrunnerroadmap.com. We will have a link in the show notes as well. That’s rebelrunnerroadmap.com. And you guys, this is the decision point. Where are you going to be when the pandemic ends? So if you want to be a runner, join the Rebel Runner Roadmap today.

Okay, I promise it’s going to be okay, my friends. You have got this. Now get your ass out there and run, and I will see you in the next episode.

Oh, and one last thing. If you enjoyed listening to this episode, you have to check out the Rebel Runner Roadmap. It’s a 30-day online program that will teach you exactly how to start running, stick with it, and become the runner you’ve always wanted to be. Head on over to rebelrunnerroadmap.com to join. I’d love to be a part of your journey.