Running is not only a physical activity; it is also a mind game when it comes to staying motivated to run. A lot of people started with their plan to run by buying all the needed running gears only to lose interest after a few tries. It might be necessary to seek first the motivation to run before spending hard-earned money on buying gears. The desire to run and the commitment to stay running will easily follow.
The first thing you have to ask yourself is why you need to run. People run for various reasons but running just because it is a fad or your friends do it will lead you nowhere. You need a more serious reason which will be your motivator for running.
Running for health reasons such as shedding excess weight could be a good motivation for running. Running, as a form of weight management, can be effective only if you are going to commit yourself to a long-term running program. Your goal of bringing your weight down to your desired level could be your greatest motivation to run. However, be warned that there will be no tangible result in the first few weeks of running so you must not be discouraged if your weighing scale will show the same result for quite a stretch of time. Running is not a quick-fix solution to a person’s weight problem; it is a new lifestyle that requires a life-time commitment.
Setting a goal for yourself, which you can monitor on a regular basis, is a great motivator for running as you see your progress in your new activity. Your enthusiasm will rise as you see tangible results in your weight-loss goal. Make a record of your progress on a daily basis. You can record the distance you run each day and how much you weigh each morning. As you notice that your distance is increasing, you may notice also that your weight is beginning to drop, no matter how small it may be. You will be motivated to run if you see that there are tangible results in your weight management plan.
Another motivator for running is setting a goal on how you progress in your running. It is given that there will be so many difficulties in the beginning of the activity. The joint pains and the muscle aches that you will experience at the beginning could be daunting but if you are really determined to reach your goal, those hardships can be overcome. The distance that you can gradually add to your daily running will encourage you to run even harder. Of course, you cannot aim to win the marathon after a few weeks of running but a few yards added to each day to the distance you cover will slowly bring you closer to your goal.
A goal that is unrealistic will result to loss of motivation because you may never reach it. On the other hand, a goal that is easily attainable could lead to boredom. It is important then that you must set a goal that is attainable but at the same time challenging.
