The Hemp Connection + tips

Slow and steady does make a difference

I love to run…I've been doing it since high school. In grad school I tore my anterior cruciate ligament in a ski accident which kept me from running for about 2 years. Ever since then, on and off, that injured knee decides it doesn't like running and I have to switch to other activities while it takes a rest.

A few years ago, I bumped my running distance up and was really enjoying my Sunday 8 and 9 mile runs. But after awhile, that bum knee spoke up and I had to cut back again.

This past summer I decided to do a city run (I usually run on the dirt canal bank near my home) while I waited for the garage to repair my car. Whatever happened during that run sidelined me for a good 6 months. I would go out to run, make it about 1/10 of a mile, and have to stop for the pain. Some days I even had trouble walking.

I finally stopped running for a couple of months and steeply curtailed my distances when I tried it again. I was afraid to try anything but the canal bank because I didn't want to hurt. It has been hard, because running is such a part of who I am.

Yesterday, I happened to be in Venice, California, with a beautiful day and a free morning on my hands, so I decided to head out to the beach. I also decided to see how my knee would handle a little running on the bike path. A half mile went by, and I felt great. But, just to be careful, I stopped and walked another half mile. I started running again, a little further this time, then stopped and walked to be sure my knee was holding up. I ran what was my normal distance at home, but noticed that the Santa Monica pier was j-u-s-t-a-l-i-t-t-l-e-p-u-s-h farther, so I made the pier my turnaround point and headed back to the Venice pier.

No knee pain! I joked on my Facebook page that my knee is ok with pavement as long as the run includes a pretty bike path and a sunny beach. But the truth is, my knee simply was ready to run again.

As I was running back, I realized that being able to run 6 miles on pavement after not running pavement at all for almost a year may have been due to the fact that I didn't just stop exercising because the thing I wanted to do and thought I should be able to do was not an option. I had to learn a couple of things to get back the thing I most wanted: (1) I had to better moderate my activity level and not overdo it, (2) I had to find other activities to do while my knee healed, and (3) I had to be consistent with my activity even if I was doing one thing when I really wanted to be doing something else.

I also thought about how many times I've heard clients say something is not working or they can't do something they've been encouraged to do. I wondered if the problem wasn't either of those, but rather that they tried the new change on the wrong day, or in the wrong set of circumstances, or as too drastic of a change from what they had done the day before.

And THEN I got to thinking that maybe, if they dialed back their expectations, and accepted that not every day with the new way would be perfect, and that it might even take months of diligence and consistency to see things pull together…maybe there would be less"I can'ts" being uttered and more,"I'm getting theres" to report.

It's not about how perfectly you make the change. It's about how well you follow through with your intent and how persistent you are over the long haul. How much you participate in your change even on days when it's inconvenient or it doesn't feel like it's helping you get anywhere.

Be persistent and envision where you want to go. Moving from the dusty canal bank to the beautiful beach is within reach of anyone who believes it.

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Slow and steady does make a difference + tips