November 3, 2015 - Written by: Alison Graham

Run Baby Run

The auburn leaves underfoot and starkly bright mornings give me a very specific déjà vu – it marks one year since I began running. I love it most in the early morning and late evening, when the light flits, either fading or broadening. Needless to say, autumn is my favourite time of year.

Positioned midway between the extremities of summer and winter, with the cold seeping in matched only by the seeking out of everything warm and hearty suits me perfectly. Normally I don’t ‘do’ mornings, but for the sake of sunlight glinting off leaves and that beautiful crisp coldness, even I can drag myself out of bed.

When running I want to enjoy my surroundings uninterrupted and undistracted, so I only run alone. It enables me to keep that forty minutes of my day as an opportunity for reflection, sometimes on difficulties I am facing and sometimes on my movement– where my feet land on the ground, how I’m moving my arms, whether my posture is right. Getting muddied and out of breath is a strange form of meditation, but believe me when I say it works.

(Image via)

What’s more, it’s so freeing to detach from your own appearance for a time (even if only for the duration of your run). Having never been a particular fan of the way I look, this is something that I take great comfort in. What would normally be an embarrassment – food caught in your teeth, smudging your eyeliner – ceases to be so.

It’s not about how you look, its about what your body can do.

For those of us who aren’t professional athletes, sports gear never quite looks the way it does in adverts; but again, that doesn’t matter. It’s about you, taking measured breaths and putting one foot in front of the other.

Contradictory as it may be, my deliberate lack of goals has motivated me. Ask me how many minutes it takes me to run a mile, or how long I can run without stopping for and I can would only be able to guess at an answer. Maybe I will take part in a race in the future, maybe I won’t – point is, I make the decision. I have no training programme. Certainly I’ve noticed peripherally that I’ve become stronger and more able over time, but I don’t need measurements for that.