Although the level of lockdown when the Corona pandemic started varied for different countries (and still varies), in most cases people stayed home as much as they could. In the Netherlands, we are still in lockdown: allowed to go out for a walk, bike ride, run, but not in groups, keeping 1.5 meters distance and staying at home after 9PM (when curfew starts). Staying healthy is important, and especially now most of us are working from home and sit for too many hours, so it is great we can go out and do something. No organized forms of sports are allowed though, so no races, no club training. Running is easy, I can do it from home and I can easily do it on my own.
However, I’m running much less than before and I hear the same from my training mates. Last year, I was training for a trail race in France in March and when that got canceled, I didn’t have a goal any longer. Plus nobody knew how long we would be in this lockdown. So at that time, it felt better to slow down, give the body rest and pick it up later when races are allowed again. That sounded reasonable, but I forgot about the mental part. My motivation to run dropped to a low point. Why would I go out anyway? My reason to go out seemed gone. I had nothing to work towards, as there were no races! It took a while to realize that I had to change my reason for running to a more internal reason: feeling good. I go out for a run because it feels good to move, it makes me happy and makes me feel fit. That’s reason in itself to go, which I had almost forgotten.
I started writing this posting during summer 2020, I think. Almost a year later, even though there seems light at the end of the tunnel, it’s still the same ‘stay at home as much as you can’ situation. I came across this article in the New York Times, titled “Why I stopped running during the pandemic (and how I started again)”, by Lindsay Crouse. She was running a lot when the orders to stay at home came. She stopped running at all, she just shut down and could only sit on her couch. It wasn’t rest, it didn’t make her feel better. Her question “What can we do to feel better in the midst of a crisis that seems like it won’t end?”, sounds familiar to me and probably to many others (runners or non-runners). She heard that when you’re in a rut, you need a nudge to take action. Waiting to feel better doesn’t work. The author found that for her to deal with the pandemic burnout isn’t going easy, it’s trying something hard.
What helped me is creating a new routine. Some of my running friends participate in online challenges. As we don’t know when everything is back to “normal” (whatever that looks like), we need to find different motivations and give ourselves a nudge (or just a kick in the but!, however hard it is to kick yourself). Go out, do something, don’t stay on that couch.
Note: the picture is me in my first 50 kilometer trail run, in 2019. I was super motivated for this run, to run long distances. It reminds me of a state of mind that I haven't had since (and I hope will be back soon)
