Having fun in the rain

I reall enjoyed my run in the rain this morning. I haven't run in wet weather for a while here in this drought-concerned area of the country.

As I ran, thinking how much fun I was having, I remembered running with someone recently who said "I don't do running in the rain".

I didn't question it at the time, but this morning I was wondering why it was that person had decided they don't do, that means never do, running in the rain.

I guess I could understand it better if they had said "I prefer running when it's not raining" or "I hardly ever run in the rain", but never?

That means if they decide they want to run a race and it's the most important race, or even the first race, they've ever run, will they not do it if it's a rainy day?

What if it starts off sunny, clouds over and then the heavens open? In that case, I think it hugely preferable to run for home and get in the dry reasonably quickly, than to slow to a walk and then plod all the way back in the rain. I, for one, would get cold.

I admit it's sometimes harder getting going when it's already raining hard, but once I get moving it's fine.

Isn't that's a bit like what it's like running anyway?

When it's raining, it's the most likely time you'll hear people saying things like, "it's a miserable day" or "isn't this weather depressing?"

In my mind there's no better place to be when the rain's coming down than out there running in it. As I run I see people desperately scurrying along trying to get out of it as soon as possible.

Me, I'm warm, breathing in the fresh air and just having fun.

If you want to change miserable to happy and depressing to fun, go run in the rain.

Why I can't trust my tongue

In the past couple of weeks I have had a piece break off two of my teeth, which I have now thankfully had patched up at the dentist.

One of the teeth broke whilst I was chewing a fairly soft energy bar on my recent four hour half marathon adventure, just to compound the problems I was already having with my left knee.

By the way if you’re wondering whether I meant to say four and a half hour marathon, no I really did mean four hour (almost) half marathon.

Whilst the broken tooth has been a minor nuisance, what’s been most interesting is the fact that I’ve discovered that my tongue is really a naughty schoolboy, disguised as a tongue, who is magnetically attracted to trouble.

I never realised that my tongue had a mind of its own. It must have because my mind had no impact on it whatever.

It didn’t matter how much I commanded my tongue (silently obviously – if I had been walking around conversing with my tongue in public, the tongue would have been the least of my problems!) to stay away from the jagged edge of one of my broken teeth, it made absolutely no difference. There it was pretty much permanently exploring back and forth over the tooth.

In my experience this is pretty much how my inner critic works.

It only takes me thinking that I have done something wrong, not done something that I should have, or done something that’s not good enough, and my inner critic is all over it covering every millimetre back and forth constantly until I do my own inner dentistry to patch up my mental “broken tooth”.

Do you have a mental “broken tooth”, and if so what could you do build your “tooth” back up and file down the rough edges?

That tongue can’t be trusted you know and needs to have temptation removed.

Calming my half marathon chimp

I walked most of the Tunbridge Wells Half Marathon course yesterday, as I ended up escorting a walker for at least five sixths of the race. We crossed the finish line together with 3 hours 47 minutes on the clock.

So definitely a record for my longest half marathon by far.

But the depressing bit is that my old left knee injury reared its ugly head again, even though I was walking. It was painful for the last third of the race and I suffered for the rest of the day.

So this morning, still feeling rather flat, I decided to try a technique from a book I'm currently reading called The Chimp Paradox.

In the book Dr Steve Peters, the author, and resident psychiatrist with the British Cycling and Sky ProCycling teams, explains that we all have several distinct parts of our brain, the two main ones being what he calls the chimp brain and the human brain.

The chimp brain is an emotional machine that uses feelings and impressions to drive emotional thinking to work out what is happening and form a plan of action.

The human brain uses logical thinking based on facts and truth to create its plan.

Steve Peters recommends looking at both brains when examining an issue.

So here's what my chimp brain thought about my disappointment from yesterday.

My chimp thinks that I might as well not bother with running, when it appears that it's all doomed. If I can't even walk 13.1 miles without injuring myself what is the point? It will only get worse. I persist with this daft mile each day to no avail.

Thanks for that chimp.

So what does my human brain think about it all?

My human brain thinks that these things happen. It thinks that in any problem or challenge there is an opportunity, and that we are surrounded by opportunities and possibilities all the time, it’s just that they come wearing disguises so that we don’t recognise the potential they contain.

My human brain thinks that this could be an opportunity to write something that could help people. It is an opportunity for me to work on my knees in terms of exploring exercises to strengthen the supporting muscles and do more with stretching than I'm already doing.

It also sees an opportunity to look at what is most important to me about my running. Is it being able to run a mile each day until I’m 80, or is it being able to run half marathons and marathons when I’m 80? Ideally it would be both, but the most important one is the first one.

So, how am I feeling now?

Well it’s really quite incredible because my human brain has managed to calm and comfort my chimp brain, who is now quite happily having a snooze, feeling warm and happy.

Check out The Chimp Paradox. There's some other good stuff in there about goblins, gremlins, autopilots and the stone of life that are all really interesting and thought provoking.

Why we should celebrate last place

Last night I helped out with the brilliant Sarah’s Runners again and I received my fluorescent bib with “Last Runner Marshall” boldly printed on it, which I will be sporting in Sunday’s fantastic Tunbridge Wells Half Marathon.

Seeing those words “Last Runner” proudly displayed reminded me of an experience my older daughter, who is now in her 20’s, had when she was about 4 or 5 and we were on holiday in Spain.

They had a fiesta on one weekend with lots of events for the children, one of which was a swimming race.

Because my daughter was probably the youngest and smallest in her swimming race, she was a lot slower than the other children, and when she still had almost a whole length to go after the other children had finished, everyone around the pool was clapping and cheering her on, and she finished the race with a huge grin on her face.

We were talking about that swimming race a couple of months ago, and she still remembered it fondly, so much so that in her head she always thought that she had won the race, because she remembers everyone clapping and cheering her on.

For many of us finishing last might bring back memories of embarrassment or we might have even blocked the memory out, but for my daughter it was a strong positive memory.

I wonder if all those people who cheered and applauded her on realise what a positive impression their generous act made on her that day, that she still remembers it over 20 years later.

What if everyone saluted and celebrated the person who came last with the same enthusiasm as they did the one who came first?

I think the world might be a better and happier place.

What do you reckon?

The lesson of the sore hand

The other day I was in our kitchen when my partner said to me “that can go in the oven”, and pointed at a frying pan with an already cooked Spanish omelette in it.

You’d think that six simple words can’t easily be open to misinterpretation.

However, once I had added my own meaning, what I actually heard was “please can you put that frying pan containing the omelette in the oven to keep warm”.

Within seconds I realised that my interpretation was wrong as I grabbed the handle of the frying pan with my bare hand and dropped it even quicker as the extremely hot handle burnt my hand in several places.

The meaning that was actually meant in those six words was “I put the frying pan in the oven to help cook the omelette, so now I know that it’s OK to put that frying pan in the oven”.

What happened in that minute or so is typical of so many conversations that go on in homes and workplaces all the time.

One person delivers a message believing the meaning to be completely clear and impossible to misinterpret. Another person hears the message and adds their own perspective and meaning to the message, and therefore receives a completely different message than the one that was intended.

What could I have done, and what could you therefore do to avoid incorrect interpretations of message that you’re given?

I could have said, “do you mean that you want me to put the frying pan in the oven to keep it warm?”

That simple confirmation question would have saved me a sore hand.

What question could you ask next time you assume you know what someone means?

As you’ve probably heard before, when you assume you make an ass of u and me!