I’m sure that you have experienced injury at some time in your running career. I have always been reluctant to use the word injury when it comes to my pains and aches. Seems as if this Saturday morning jogger, semi-demi-runner, is getting notions far above his station by declaring to be injured. “He is carrying an injury” or “He has been ruled out due to injury” is more appropriate when discussing Tony Kelly or Wayne Rooney or Sean Hehir. But when that pain or ache stubbornly refuses to depart the body of the Saturday morning jogger, well then maybe one is entitled to mention to a friend that a glute or a hamstring is causing trouble, without using the word injury, of course.
Has the groin or a shin or a blister caused you to stop running? Did you have to lie on past 08.00 on Saturday mornings due to some muscular ache? If so did you miss those Saturday morning run? Did you miss getting out there, chatting away with whoever? Did you miss the sense of something worthwhile achieved at the end of the run? Did you miss that cosy feeling of belonging? You may have even felt guilt at not rising. And then, inexplicably, did it become more difficult to get back on the road after a few weeks of inactivity? The pain has ceased to be your nagging companion. But the bang of the front door as you leave for DNG has lost some of its gloss too. You feel a bit of a sham, one minute complaining that you cannot get your runs in and then feeling threatened by feeling well again. Its neurotic stuff, this deep personal doubt and conflict, this double standard.
A Timothy Gallworthy wrote a book The Inner game of Golf in which he describes the ongoing conflict between Self 1 and Self 2 in the golfer. For golfer substitute runner. Self 2 is the good cop. Self 1 is forever nagging the player, in our case the runner, always planting doubts, gnawing away at the confidence of the individual, always finding fault with performance, undermining. On the other hand Self 2 is the natural athlete who wants to go out, run, enjoy the experience, breathe in the fresh air, link up with like-minded runners. When one is fit and injury-free Self 2 banishes all of the self doubt planted by Self 1 and one feels confident. Plans are laid for the next 10k, the next half marathon, the last Monday in October is biroed onto the diary in capitals. One can judge the level of confidence in the group at present by the ambitions of some to move up to the 50k. Note the tone of the blogs written by Ronan and Siobhan. Yes there is realism in each article but the self belief and the ambitions shine through. Self 1 is controlled by the confident swagger of Self 2 in those blogs. But spare a thought for our injured friend. Self 1 worms its way into the confidence and loves its newly found dominance. “You overdid it and now look at you”, he/she taunts. Progress is crippled by self doubt. Saturday mornings seem somehow wetter and colder, at least from the pillow. The pillow has developed a magnetic force stronger than that of the front door banging closing behind you.
Maybe you know someone whose Self 1 is prevailing and as a result has lost touch with the group on Saturday mornings. Maybe all that person needs is a word of encouragement to reignite the influence of Self 2. Maybe you need that word of encouragement yourself from Self 2. This jogger feels that his Self 2 needs to administer a good kick up the...ooops!