Oh, yes.

I listened to an awesome podcast by Zen and the Art of Triathlon this weekend, "How to Train", and it really helped shift my mindset about my training right now.  He talks about polarized training and doing almost all your training either really easy or really hard - limiting the really hard bits to just 15-20 min./sport/week.

I took that philosophy into my trail run this morning and oh. my. goodness. did it change the way I felt after.  It really made me realize the way I've been driving myself into the ground since Noah was born to try and get back into shape, like, yesterday.  And that, like my perfectionist tendencies in general, was actually totally defeating my purpose.  I'd overtrain, get injured or sick, and have to quit for awhile.  Then, start the whole damn thing over again.  Now, I've had some successes since then.  The Half Mari in Kansas City a couple of years ago was great.  But, even then, I think I've been dancing on the edge of overtraining for years now.

I know better.  I really do.  When I actually did this right, eight years ago, I did a LOT of slow stuff punctuated by intervals.  The slow stuff drove me NUTS - it did - but it made me stronger and more resilient and happier.  Like this morning's run.

I'm at a very base level of fitness right now.  Fast is like 9:45 for me and I can only maintain that for a short time.  Zone 1-2 is over a 12 minute mile just now.   And that's humbling, it is.  But I have to make peace with where I am if I want to get to where I want to be.  So, today, I did just a few hard intervals in my running segments (I'm still taking walking breaks of a minute every ten minutes).  I didn't even get 7 minutes of hard in and I took it WAY easier on the rest of the run than I have been.  But I feel AMAZING right now.  I didn't finish the starving or shaky or in need of a nap - as I have been.  We'll see if I feel the need for a nap later this morning.

But, I think I'm on to something.  If I can just relinquish that pride and that brutal self-bullying and that need to be somebody I was a long time ago and just release myself into what is - I actually have fun.  I LOVED being out there - like I always do, but I loved it without feeling like I was about to keel over.

So, there is a life lesson here - DUH! - in addition to a training lesson.  I hope I can hang onto it for awhile.