The One Thing I Changed to Become a Better Runner
It wasn’t my skill, it was my mindset.
When I first started running a couple of months ago, I was obsessed with the numbers. I was constantly checking my watch every 30 seconds to see if I was on pace. But after I stopped doing that, things changed. In the beginning, I was focused only on a goal: passing a fitness test. But as I ran more, I realized that wasn’t my real goal. You can read more about that experience in the article below.
All I wanted was to achieve a particular time. A time that would guarantee me passing the fitness test. I kept looking down. I kept doing the math in my head. I wasn’t motivated by a personal goal, but rather by a societal one. I didn’t want to experience the embarrassment of not passing that fitness test. I read many blogs about how to run better and faster, but this one change was the one that made the difference.
I stopped looking at my watch.
One average day, when my run was looking like it was gonna be like all the others, I decided that I wouldn’t look at my watch that day while running. What I found is that I almost magically became faster. That run felt tremendously easier and faster. I hadn’t done anything different in terms of my running abilities. It was all in the mindset.
Before then, I had always had the mindset that running was just for the time being. Once I passed the fitness test, I could just stop running. Once I stopped looking at my watch though, I found I enjoyed running more because I was able to look at what was going on around me, I was able to be more aware of my surroundings and feel more in tune with myself. It also made it much easier to focus on a target past which to run.
By simply cutting the technology out of my running, not only did I become a better runner, but I also enjoyed it more and was able to achieve the one thing that got me out the door most days — an urge to get away from my screen for even thirty minutes.
