I wonder at times what makes me stop doing the things I’m are good at and that I love doing.  For me I am talking about my running.  A year or two ago I wrote up a little something which was about who and what I want to be within the world of running.  I had no idea what I was really doing but now years later I see that I was planting a seed of direction some wehere within me that ended up blooming into the path that I have been exploring since then.  This in itself is a pretty incredible possibility of you sit and think about it for a little while.

So the question remains, why did I stop running for the past few weeks.  Funny, as I write that I realize that it really only has been a few weeks.  Maybe 3 at the most but still it feels like an eternity.  I was into such a great routine of running and cycling that when I stopped the running and barely rode my bike as I did in this holidays season I felt a huge void in my life.  I hadn’t realized how much emotional and spiritual comfort I get from running and cycling until it wasn’t there and my emotions and spirit was searching for their usual partner.  As much as I don’t like relying on athletics for an emotional crutch sometimes there’s nothing I can do about it, to a certain extent that’s just what happens.  This holiday season I could have used it too.

I work in retail.  At a book store, one of the all time great book stores.  In the top 10 in the US, and yes I say that with pride.  In the holidays it gets crazy.  This holiday season it got CRAZY.  In a good way crazy, we had way more sales and way more customers than we did last year which is good for us as we constantly fight with the ebooks and also good for the world of independent book stores which is a world I plan on being a part of for the rest of my life.  The holidays were beautiful and amazing yet emotionally rough and spiritually trying for me as I’m sure they were for many other people who work retail as well.  I was so exhausted that I was always opting to not run so I wan’t getting my release.

My thoughts for the past few days have been that maybe in 2012 what I need to do with running is not go for any huge distance goals like I did in 2011.  Maybe what I need to do is to build a regularity with my running and accept a part of running that I have always been afraid of, it being a healthy instant emotional release for the bad days I have.  In that way, using it as way more of a practice like meditation, not a solution for any problems like therapy, but more like a practice that brings clarity to my life so that I can approach hard days and hard happenings with grace and dignity and fully take in the beautiful days and beautiful happenings.

In a way this post is a celebration for me.  One of “Hell yes it feels great to be back to running.”and also a celebration of another seed I am planting in my life so that I can aim myself toward the path I want to take with my running and cycling in 2012.  I hope you all had an amazing 2011 full of ups and downs and I also hope that 2012 for you is even better.