When the “Great Pause” as in my mind it will be known started in early March, no one knew what it would mean.   No one knew how long it would last.   In the beginning, most of us treated it as a snow day where time stopped.    No rules.   No expectations.   PJ’s all day.   Then again, maybe that was just my house.   The only one who remained on a regular schedule is my husband who immediately started working from home.  

So while life as we knew it changed, we only thought it was temporary.   Yet, here we are …months later still trying to figure it all out. Realizing this is not a pause but a temporary new way of life.  This is what we need to do…… for much longer than we ever imagined.   In ways we never thought of.

So now it’s time to hit the play button and take our lives off pause. Slowly…. Cautiosly…. Smartly… Taking things off of pause and restarting in small steps.

Here it the thing though….. It is also time to evaluate what things that we paused that didn’t serve us, our families and our lives. Prior to the pause everyone wore “busy” as a badge of honor when maybe it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Many for the first time in years have been able to have family dinners because everyone wasn’t over scheduled. There were not parents heading off in opposite directions with different kids only to meet exhausted at the end of the day. There was time to do puzzles together, game nights, and just time to putz around the house to actually just be.

I’ve kind of done the same thing with my running. There were no races to train for. No events that I felt I would miss if I didn’t do. There were no expectations. I could just be. Leading me to get back into practicing yoga and slow things down. And while I have signed up for virtual events, the expectations for them is much different.

So with that I Started walking. Taking that step back from running. Enjoying just being. At first it was not intentional. It really started just because it had gotten extremely hot and humid, so I thought walking would be better. Then I realized that this is what I needed. I began getting out every day and while I am not “on a streak,” I am going on 3 weeks without missing a day. So now I have a small goal of hitting a month streak.

At first, I felt like I should be doing more. Than I should at least attempt to run. That this was not pushing myself. Then I realized that I didn’t want to push. That I had no need to push. That sometimes you have to go back to the beginning to get where you need to go. With that there was a mindset change.

My walks are not Sunday Strolls, but more of a power walk pace. Walking with purpose as they call it. I want to get my legs used to a set pace for walking because I also know that when I do add running back in that walking MUST be part of the conversation. Eventually, races will start again. Eventually, I will sign up and be training for one again. When that time comes, I know that in order for me to be consistent, be effective that I will need to do a mix of walk/running.

So as with life, I will start to evaluate what has not served me well in my running. I will evaluate and adjust. Until I am ready to take the next step in running (the C25K), I will walk with purpose using the time to listen to some Podcasts and just be.

I know that I may not have been using this pause as efficiently as some, but to me life isn’t always about the finish line but the way you get there.