Day 2: How I chose Half-Marathons

I have 3 sisters and no brothers (well, no blood related brothers, but I do have one brother-in-law). I'm second. We currently span the ages of 19-31. Sister #1 lives with her husband in Brooklyn. They're self-proclaimed vagabonds and love to travel. New York City is their current adventure. Sisters #3 and #4 live in McKenzie, TN where they both attend Bethel University. I'm outside of Atlanta. There is one time per year that we're guaranteed a visit home that includes all 4 of us, and that is Christmas. Not Christmas Day, necessarily, but the Christmas "season". Other than that, I'll try to make it back to Nashville during the summer with the littles are home from school, or my older sister and BIL will come through Atlanta to visit their best friends and I'll get to see them then.

So we talked one day. The four of us. And we decided that we wanted to do something that would allow us to intentionally see each other at a time that wasn't Christmas. We also discussed how out of shape we all were and how we wanted to do something that would be good for us and fun too. So we settled on half-marathons. We thought it would be unrealistic to try and schedule one every year, so we decided on every two years, with the first one being in 2014. Since we are currently still in 2013, I cannot tell you yet if our plan worked. I'm on schedule to do a half every other year because I ran my first one last November in 2012. I've finally coerced the littles into training for something, and the three of us will run a 15K in January, but there are 11 whole other months after that for the 4 of us to fit in a half-marathon. We talked about trying to take a trip somewhere to run it. That way, we'd see each other for a weekend and be able to split hotel costs 4 ways and see new places. Or if it was a year that we needed to save money, we'd meet in a place where one of us lives so we wouldn't have hotel costs. There are exceptions written into our deal for sickness, pregnancy, new babies, and other various life events that would prevent someone from traveling or running 13.1 miles. [Side note: if one of us had a newborn, I'm pretty sure the other three of us could travel to that person and run there. I'm SURE that could be arranged.]

Anyway...that's the plan. We figured it's good for us. 13.1 miles isn't too terribly hard on your body, and it doesn't take forever to train for that distance. It's also good for us emotionally because if you have sisters, you know...sometimes you just need your sisters. Hopefully, we can convince Sister #1 to start training too, because as of January, the other three of us will be running 9.3 miles, and that's not so far from 13.1. :)


This post is a part of The Nester's 31 Days blogging project. Click here to see the directory of all 31 posts related to my topic: 31 Days to Retraining.

Day 1: Why?

I decided to start with the "Why?" of REtraining for a race because I'm still kind of working that out for myself. I actually love running. I know some people hate it, and I can understand that. I personally hate jumping jacks, and you will never see me doing them joyfully. So I understand the anti-running mentality.

I used to think I hated running. Or that I wasn't "good" at it (can you even BE bad at running? Isn't it just a basic life skill?). Then, one day in the early fall of 2011, I decided to try it. I downloaded the Nike+ running app to my little iPhone, and took off. I ran one quarter of a mile without stopping and it freaked me out, so I stopped. Yes that is the truth. I thought I'd pass out or collapse if I ran more than a few steps, so I was shocked when I ran a whole .25 of a mile. The next day, I ran an entire mile. I'd love to tell you that "the rest is history" and I'm a disciplined, steady runner whether I have a race to train for or not, but that's not true. A couple of months after that first running adventure, I broke my toe and that put me out of commission for a while.

Fast forward 6 months or so. I walked a 5K in April of 2012, and decided after that to find a race and get back to training. I'm from Nashville, but moved to the Atlanta area in 2011, so I looked for half-marathons in either place. (See tomorrow's post on what made me decide to run half-marathons.) I found one I wanted to do in Nashville on November 10 and found a training program I could actually see myself doing. And from THERE, the rest is history. I ran my first half-marathon last November--almost a year ago now. My goals for the race were: 1. Don't finish last. 2. Don't fall down. 3. Run the whole time. I'm happy to tell you that I reached all 3 goals! (I dream real big.)

From then on, I've been inconsistent. That's pretty much the story of my life. I commit to do something, and then miss some days weeks months, and I kind of give up. I've found, however, that I'm less likely to give up if I have accountability. If someone is counting on me, I'll do my part. That's why I chose to write about getting back in to running for my 31 Days adventure. If you (whoever you are) are reading this, you're holding me accountable whether you know it or not. So, thank you. :) I also managed to talk my little sisters into running a 15K (9.3 miles) with me in Atlanta in January. I made them a training schedule based on the Hal Higdon training plan, and I'm going to stick to the same plan they're doing too. I'm going to specifically work on getting faster this time. We're starting with low miles so we can build a solid base, and I'd like to be faster. Since speed was not one of my goals for my first half, I have something to work off of and I can try to beat my time in the next one.

So here we are. I ran two days last week to get ready for this week, but today is the REAL start of my training plan, and it's also the start of the 31 Days of blogging. Thanks for being here and going on this journey with me. I want to take care of myself--mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually--and running benefits all of those areas for me. I have lots of reasons why I want to run again, but I feel like God wants to take me somewhere deeper with it and with this blogging process. I'm ready for it, and I'm happy to take you with me!

Loves.

Bro? Brothers? ...Brethren?

This week has been a rough one for the littlest sister. I won't go into details here, but she's been sad and her heart has been hurting. She's my sister. We're "cut from the same cloth"..."kindred spirits". When she hurts, I hurt. Physically and emotionally. I don't know if that's normal or unusual because I've never known anything else. I have 3 sisters, and we all not only love each other, but we like each other too. We enjoy spending time together. Whenever I go home, I always see a sister. I don't always see my friends, but I always see at least one sister. That's what we do. The oldest is coming through Atlanta on Thursday, so we're going to get coffee. That's what we do too. Coffee. It's our thing. Sister-friendships and coffee.

Anyway... thinking about how my sister's pain causes me pain and how seeing any of them happy makes me happy got me thinking about another family I'm in...the family of God. I taught in Sunday School this week, and our lesson was about how nothing can take us out of the family of God once we're in. It's the same type of bond that we share with our physical families. Just like nothing I do can change my DNA and make me no longer related to my biological family, nothing I do can change my status in the family of God. Once you accept His gift of salvation, you're in forever.

Paul writes to the Romans about how we, as Christians, should act...

Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. 

Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. 

Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. 

Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. 

Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. 

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. 

Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. 

Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. 

Never be wise in your own sight. 

Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. 

If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. 

Romans 12:9-18 

All those things in italics remind me of my relationship with my sisters. Or how it should be. That's how our relationships with ALL other Christians should be. With ALL PEOPLE even. The verse that confirms this for me is 18... "so far as it depends on you...". So many times I allow my self to get in the way and I don't let the love of God shine through me. So many times I base my actions and reactions on the actions of others. That's really not smart. Especially if that other person is not a Christian. 

I grew up fighting with my sisters. I still fight with my sisters. But if any of you decided to fight with my sisters, you'd have to go through me. Back in May, I wrote a blog about how stupid it is for us (Christians) to fight with each other when we're really on the same side of the battle. Ephesians tells us our battles aren't against flesh and blood anyway. And Exodus tells us that the Lord will fight for us, so we just have to be still (and not try to fight for ourselves). But here we are...fighting amongst ourselves instead of sticking up for each other like siblings. We don't defend each other against our enemy. We don't go to the Lord in prayer on behalf of each other nearly enough. We don't try to outdo each other in showing honor. We try to outdo each other in popularity and recognition and accolades. (Pharisees, anyone?) If possible, as far as it depends on us, we look our for ourselves. If our needs are met and everything we want is happening, then we'll be perfectly peacable with each other. If not, then the gloves come off and Lord help whoever is in our way. Because obviously our personal agenda is much more important than God's agenda, right? No. Not according to Paul in Romans 12. Paul says we're supposed to bless those who persecute us. What do you think that means we should do for those who love us? Good news. Read it again. He tells us. Thanks, Paul! 

Let me assure you that I do not get this right. Especially Even with my biological siblings. But I'm trying. Ask me about it. I'm trying to be more like Jesus. I want to be more like Jesus. And it sure is a process! Hold me accountable. And let's try to live like Paul tells us to. 

Loves.

New.

It's funny to me how scary that word is. Say it with me: "New." Funny-strange. Not funny-haha.
Sometimes there's so much "new" that I just need some "old" or "familiar" for my soul. That's how I'm feeling these days. It's not that there are so many things happening. Just life. But that's enough.

So to counteract the new, I'm listening to a lot of country music--The Westbound Rangers, in particular. That's my "familiar" right now. (haters gonna hate...)

I've also been talking to my sisters a lot. I love having sisters. We're growing up and our lives are changing and that is weird! But it's also really cool to think about all four of us being adults. With 12 years between Amanda and Autumn, we'll never ever be in the same phase of life at the same time, but if you count "adulthood" as a phase of life, we will be from September of this year when Autumn turns 18 until we die. That's pretty cool. My mom and her sisters have taken trips by themselves over the years to try to keep the special relationship that sisters share in tact, so Amanda and I have started planning our trips like that. We're going to run. It's not realistic for us to think about taking a trip together every year, so we're going to meet somewhere for a 1/2 marathon every other year. We're starting in 2014. That gives us time to train and plan and save money. There aren't any rules, so I know there will be some years where families will be involved or someone will be pregnant or sick or something unexpected will happen. But we're going to try this and see how it goes. We're going to run until we're too old. This is kind of strange since none of us have ever run a 1/2 (or whole...) marathon before, but it's something that's on my bucket list, so I'm forcing it on the other 3. :) Just kidding. Kind of. Anyway, I think it will be fun, and everyone else is on board too! We don't all agree on anything, so this is a big deal. Must be a sign that it's the right thing. ;)

In unrelated news, 8 of my friends are getting married in the next year. I might need some new dresses.

Love.