Hello everyone, this is Helen Huang @ Organizing, based in Beijing, China. In order to better learn and practice the YiXiaoNeng Time Management System, after finished publishing 100 Chinese articles, I decided to continue writing and publishing a daily English article in another 100 days based on the "YeWuBin Time Management 100 Episodes" audio program. Today is the 139th day.
Today's topic is: From Simple Jogger to a Marathon Runner
In today's lecture, we will continue to talk about how I have integrated various time management concepts into my daily life.
Many of my friends have heard of marathons, but few have dared to attempt them. Do you remember, in a previous lesson, how I said we must fall in love with our bodies? Today, we will not talk about the importance of movement, but rather, incorporate movement into our daily life. To do this, integrate several of the time management skills together.
First we need to establish a long term and ambitious goal. Then, we must start small by breaking the task down into small and achievable chunks. We all understand this is how to do this. Instead let's discuss how we should deal with the numerous challenges and setbacks that come with training for this marathon, I will share my personal story with you to help explain this.
I used to be a poor athlete. At college, I failed the 1500 meter run test. I even failed the make-up exam. I was only able to pass with help of many people. I was so inept and disgusted with my ability to run, that I vowed I would never run again. Over the years, I kept true to my word. Even though I organized a few walks, I never ran.
So why did I decide to finally begin running again after all those years? The reason is this: I needed a challenge. I needed an ambitious goal. At the same time, I had an idea: I wanted to make running automatic in my life, just like brushing teeth or breathing.
At first, I had this great desire to do this, but no willpower to actually start. Until one day, I finally took the first step. I wrote my goal down in my Omnifocus. I would run a marathon in the next three years. We often say that standing at the starting line, looking out towards the goal, and the distance will seem impossible to achieve. But looking back from the finish line, we will be surprised how much shorter it was in reality.
A year later I was completely out of breath after running only 500 meters. I was frustrated but I urged myself to continue training. I decided my willpower would be stronger than my desire to quit. But, despite my willpower and spirit, my brain could not ignore the simple fact: I was not making any progress with my running.
Then, one day, I shared my running data to my circle of friends, and a student of Yixiaoneng happened to see it. He wrote me a private letter explained that my heart rate was too high while I ran. I was very surprised. I thought my heart rate was good while running. Despite this, I allowed myself to accept his feedback and asked him how I could reduce my heart rate while running. The student taught me about running movement and introduced a sports coach to me named Wu Dong. I learned a great deal from this running coach, Mr. Wu Dong and my running steadily improved after that.
What is the lesson here? The lesson is to learn and to share! The more you share, the more you will gain. Dare to share, and others will give you important feedback on what they see. In previous lessons, we emphasized the importance of feedback in improving execution，especially the critical ones.
While communicating, the running coach Wu Dong told me that we must slowly start our runs and gradually increase our pace. This will allow the appropriate rhythm of the heart. If we do this and let our heart rate increase naturally, then we will feel more comfortable with our runs. I continued this training each day and slowly increased my distance while maintaining my heart rate. I was able to run further and further each day.
Slowing down and creating incremental goals reduces our need to complete the whole task all at once, and gives us incremental success encouraging us to continue onwards.
Last September, I ran my first 10 kilometers. After completing 10 kilometers, I felt extreme pride and motivation to push myself further. After coming to this realization, I also realized that jogging was not so painful, and that it warms our bodies up and gives us a great mood.
Pain is temporary. If we can learn to enjoy it and get satisfaction from it, then we can do it for a long time. So I will share one thing with you: Love is not persistence.
I have a lot of very talented friends around me, and I share my knowledge with them freely. This is a very practical need for me. Two heads are always better than one. Therefore, I recommend sharing and sharing a lot. Remember sharing is a form of active learning that will help you retain the information. It will also help you and others.
This past June I ran my third half marathon at the Lanzhou marathon. Here are the results of the three half marathons I ran:
1) Last October, I finished the half marathon in 3 hours;
2) This April, I finished the half marathon in 2.5 hours;
3) This June, I finished the half marathon in 2 hours and 15 minutes.
My speed in the 5 KM and 10 KN races has also been steadily improving.
In reality, the marathon is not the reason I wanted to set the goal. Just setting the goal got me to move and it motivated me to continue moving. Goals have this effect of urging you to get up and move. Isn't that what we all need?
What areas of your life do you need movement in? Just remember that a marathon is an extreme form of movement and that you should start slowly. Start moving towards your goal slowly and then continue to run for a long time, your speed will naturally increase until you will be ready to conquer the goal you have set.
That's all the sharing today. Thank you being with me together today. Have a wonderful day!