Life is cyclical – that is something that I have been realizing lately.

If one of my kids come to me and say that they are having a difficult time with work or with a friend, I say, “life is cyclical; if today is a bad day, a good day is coming and, unfortunately the same is true in the other direction.”  There are good days and bad days.  If you can’t see beyond today, then you believe everyday will be the same as today.  That can lead to depression or to exhilaration; both are bad if you can’t see past today.  The key to life is to understand that you can learn from good days and bad days.

That was a bit of my philosophical side coming through there, but it applies to running and to my blog.

I have found out over the past 14 months of running that there are great days and horrible days running.  In between those days are just normal days.  I have been having a bit of a difficult time lately because of the heat.  I have gone from running an average of 8:30 pace to getting excited to hit 9:30.  To me that has been a bit depressing.  I have been telling myself, it is the heat.  It is the Summer setting in (of course we are still in Spring).  Still, to go through 3 or 4 weeks of slowing down and just being happy to finish and meet my mileage goal rather than my pace goal has been difficult.  Even on my Run Plan tab above, I have changed the emphasis to mileage and not pace.  What really worries me is that in September I need both mileage and pace.

Then there was yesterday.

It was a little cooler and overcast when I went out to run.  I have a reduced week of running this week to recover some from the higher mileage I have put in, so that is also a help.  I began my run and it began to rain.  It rained hard!  Then the thunder hit about mile 1.5.  I decided to head home and hope it passed by.  After about 10 minutes the thunder stopped and it was still pouring outside, but I decided to go back to my run anyway.  I had to stay close to home so I could go inside if lightening started, but it was still fun.  The rain made it cool and my run went great.

I began running at about a 9:00 pace.  The next two miles were near 8:30 pace.  The forth mile was near 8:00 and my final mile was 7:55!  It was soooo nice to be able to run faster for a change.  Of course 7:55 is going to be my marathon pace so that one mile will be my average for 26 miles, but who is counting.  I am just ecstatic that I ran well and had a great time in the rain.

Life is cycular.  I know there will be hot, humid days ahead where I’ll be glad to hit my 9:30 pace.  But today I am so thankful for my run yesterday.  It gives me hope and keeps the fire burning.