Most of my job is dealing with fear. Telling people who are about to start running that they’re going to be uncomfortable, but will make it. Or tell people who going to run thier first 5k, 1/2 marathon or marathon that they’re going to be ok. My go-to line is, “You’ll be fine.” Sometimes I am not sure if people are going to be succeful in thier goal, but people like to hear these words. I never promised that people will complete thier goal, but I know that they will be better on the other side.
Fear is a funny little friend. A common thing that scares people is that they will not be able to keep up. Some people are worried about facing the realizm of how out of shape they are like a compulsive gambler looking at their checking account for the first time is years. For people who are coming back to running from a injury, and they are worried about getting injured again. It’s all very scary, those questions and concerns and they are exhausting. Some people don’t have the stomach to face it or deal with it. I know that they will be fine, that they are not going to die, but I empathies with what their head might be telling them. This is what some brave people tell me that is eating at thier head when they run.
“How did you get this way?”
“What is all that giggling?”
“Remember when you were fast, and 28?”
“What will my friends say if they see me trying to do something about my body?”
“What will my mom say? Will she laugh at me?”
“Whay if I am too heavy to run, and my body breaks?
“What if people laugh at me?”
“I don’t think my body was made to run.”
” I can’t believe I need to exercise on top of everything else I have going on. How will I find the time?”
I know all of these, because I have heard it in my head at one point or another. And when I started, I use to genltly whisper to that loud voice, “You’ll be fine.” And I was. Now that whisper is louder, so loud that I get to say it out loud to myself, and to all the people I coach. You may fail, you might get hurt, someone might laugh at you. It could happen. But I promise that you’ll survive it and you’ll be fine.