Changing your mindset from 'running for exercise' to 'running for fun'
The trouble with getting older is that most of your friends are also older. It depends on how active you were in your younger days and if you managed to stay active now that you are older. The only difference is that the level of being active is more than likely less vigorous than 20 or 30 years ago. If you had a fair amount of success in your younger years, it is nice to recall some of those experiences. If the rest of the group is near the same age categories, they can bring in their stories of younger days as well. What brings this to mention is that while eating out the other evening, our waiter was a weight lifter and triathlete. My friend and I mentioned that years ago we lifted weights and I mentioned that I had run a few marathons. Since the waiter was into fitness and exercise he stopped to listen to a few of our past experiences. The point is that talking about things that have happened in the past is not a topic many younger ages are interested in. I listened to a lecture at a convention many years ago and the topic was, “You are only as good as your last claim to success.”
I started thinking about what changes of how we do our exercise as we get older. It reminded me of the comic “Family Circus” when the three kids were running down the sidewalk and the older one commented, “When we get older, running won’t be fun. It will just be exercise.” What was it that made activity and running change from fun to exercise? Was it that in physical education classes we had to run laps around the track as punishment? Was it in football at the end of practice you had to run “gassers” of 40-yard sprints? It seems that in too many times, exercise was used as a punishment and that mindset stayed with you. Was it the fact that at the age of 16 we were able to get a driver’s license and instead of walking to our friends house to visit we now drove? Now we drove and watched the younger kids run and looked at that activity as “silly” that just a few years ago was fun. Running was no longer “cool” as driving in your parent’s car to go down one or two blocks to see a friend.
Whatever the reason, running suddenly became exercise and was no longer that “fun” thing we did just for the joy of it. Watching young children at various events, you see the kids running around. Punishment to them is being made to “sit down and behave.” I still see the younger kids running after foul balls at a baseball game, running to get some popcorn or cotton candy, or just doing exercises in their seats or on a handrail. Kids will chase butterflies, rabbits, race other kids, or racing a car to the next stop sign. This last weekend, two young kids in the family were “sprinting” between two lines in the dirt road. I went out and used my watch in the timing mode and started to time them. They ran another dozen times trying to get a faster time. They were running fast and the fact that it was for a time made it different and fun. Kids just have to move to get rid of their energy and sitting is not what they want.
As an adult, especially one that is getting older, it isn’t so much as exercise is fun as it is a chance to feel good. It feels good to have the muscle move again, the breathing deep into the lungs, and just the joy of wind in the face and the feeling that you are doing something that is healthy and good for you. If you are fortunate enough to build up your long-distance running, there is a chance that you might experience a “runner’s high”. This is a feeling where the legs feel like they can go forever, the body is moving fast with no effort and everything is in rhythm. This feeling only happens on a few occasions, but it makes the run one of those you remember and look at it like you did when you were young.
Running as an adult is usually looked at as exercise and necessary for health and fitness. Maybe it is one reason there are so many “former runners” or “ex-runners” that tried running as an activity but quit. It is nice as you get older to be able to look back at those fun days of running. Just remember that if you try to go back and relive those days of fun that you are now older and probably out of shape. Hopefully you also learned common sense and start off with this in mind. Slow and easy still makes it fun and not punishment or necessary for health.
It is time to get back to that basic principle of “run for fun” and experience the joy of feeling young again. It is still essential to keep running for health and fitness but include the attitude of going back to the simpler days of children and run for fun.
