It’s official, after 10 half-marathons, I’m training to complete my dream of running a full marathon. It’s 4 months away but I started training for it a month ago. Well, I’ve actually been running consistently for over a year now, so I have a lot of km under my belt. I’m up to running about 22km for my long runs.
After several long runs, I realized that I have a few tips to share for those of you who are looking to increase their kilometers but not sure how to keep motivated:
- Listen to podcasts. When I first started running I found that podcasts were a great way to keep me running long distance. I was so into them that I wanted to run until they ended and they were about 40-50 min long. My personal favourite podcast is Ted Radio hour. A compilation of various TED talks about a specific topic. Other great podcasts that I enjoy include: Oprah’s Super Soul conversations, Optimal living daily, How I built this (for those of you who enjoy business / entrepreneurs), and #Momtruths (by my friends @catandnat).
- Listen to music. Once I started running longer distances (over 10km), I found that listening to 2 podcasts was too long. I also found that I needed something that was more upbeat to give me the extra boost for endurance. So I switched to music after the podcast was done. Now I just listen to music. I have a playlist that I created and downloaded so it doesn’t use up any data when I listen to it on my runs.
- Use reverse psychology. I find that it’s more motivating to count down my kilometers backwards. So instead of counting the first 1 km, on lets say a 20km run, I count it as 19km. It’s great motivation when you start as you feel excited about the distance and towards the end of you run, it’s nice to know that you only have 3, or 2 or 1km left to go.
- Forest bathing. Not always easy when you’re running through a concrete jungle but hear me out. Forest bathing is the act of meditating in nature. While I love the peace and quiet of running to my own thoughts, they sometime go to some very dark places. When I need to re-focus or just generally get my mind off a negative train of thought, I use the method of forest bathing. I focus on the trees, the grass, bushes, Leaves, flowers and animals. Basically, anything in nature to help me re-focus and calm my brain. I do this frequently during my long runs and find that it helps ease my mental and physical tension. For example, look out for the various shades of greenery along your run, or try and spot purple flowers, or count how many butterflies you spot along your run.
- Reward yourself. Whenever I’m running and it’s not going well, I always think about what my reward will be at the end of my run. Maybe I’ll treat myself to a nice cold coffee or tea from Starbucks or some salted caramel chocolate. Perhaps it’s a nice cold beer or a glass of red wine in the backyard. Whatever it is, adding a little reward in the form of positive reinforcement helps.
If you’re a runner, I would love to hear your tips.