New Year, New You! (Or something)

In 2013, I joined an online game called 2013in2013 - it's an ongoing game on the message boards of Runners World where teams compete against each other for the highest mileage each week.  In order to get placed on a team, you have to say what your goal mileage is for the year.  I wanted to pick 650, but got talked into 750, being told it would be totally easy and doable.  Sure. No big.  

If you read my blog with any regularity (or caught it earlier this week), you'll know that 750 did not happen for me.  My teammates didn't mind, they were very supportive, but in the back of my head was the little voice reminding me that I'd failed at something.  I mostly ignore that voice, because, dude, that girl is a BITCH, but, still.  So a few days ago, I decided that even though I would not be joining 2014in2014, I still "needed" a goal for the year.  So I picked 750 again, thinking I needed some kind of re-match.  (Yes, against an arbitrary number, in my head.  I never said I made sense!)  

Then, I read Jan's post and these words really resonated with me: 

When you focus on the practice instead of the performance, you can enjoy the present moment and improve at the same time.

Talk about mind-blowing.  I'd never thought about it that way.  Instead of setting an arbitrary goal of x amount of miles, maybe just focus on running?  Each day? Maybe be pleased with an individual run instead of thinking about in terms of how much closer it's gotten me to my goal? 

Wow. 

So, no goal for me this year.  I went onto Running Ahead, where I keep my running log (highly recommend this website, by the way) and deleted my Goal widget.  No more little box telling me how much further I had to run, no more feeling badly if the pace bunny is ahead of me.  How freeing! 

I do know that I'll be participating in a few races/events this year, so of course I'll be doing some kind of training and trying to hold myself accountable for that, but I really think that not having an overall goal for the year is going to help me stay positive.  We'll see. 

By the way........ anyone else having trouble with the whole 2014 thing? Where are the flying cars? How did I get so old? LOL   Happy New Year!