Finding Motivation in the Winter

I am seriously having some problems getting motivated not only to run this frigid winter weather but really to do anything. Somehow I pulled myself out of bed and went to the gym this morning. I’m working on doing strength training twice a week as I’ve heard it helps to cross-train when you are doing long distance running.

It was hard for me to motivate myself to literally get out of bed this morning as it was 12 degrees outside. Every morning I always know how blisteringly cold it is because I take out my dog first thing when I wake up. Often I try to convince myself that going outside again would be certain death and I must protect myself by staying on the couch and watching “The View” I realize this is my general winter procrastination. I am from Arizona and even though I have lived in a cold weather climate for almost nine years I often decide to hibernate when the weather gets cold.

When bears hibernate they often eat themselves chunky then go down for a winter-long nap. When Tiffany hibernates she does so with a bottle of wine and a bag of peanut M&Ms.

This not the best running food I understand. I am working very hard in the next few months to pay better attention to what I eat. My goals are to eat breakfast, cut down on the sugar, cut down on the useless carbs and eat more veggies.

When I trained for my half marathon I thought running meant that I could eat whatever I wanted to. This isn’t the case. I think this is why some runners end up gaining weight when training for a race. I can’t bear to think that after running crazy training runs I won’t at least look better in my bathing suit on the beach this winter.

In the winter I, like a lot of people, I tend to overeat partly because I get cold and moody. The weird thing about that is by overeating I don’t really fuel my body correctly for running and I feel even more moody.

So I’m going to try to fuel my body for good, not evil. I would rather my agent tell me that I’m looking thinner than “wow, you are getting a runner’s butt.”