Flip i317537

Phew, so I’m about to commit to something pretty major…

I will run at least one mile a day, every day.  No matter what.  Ok, maybe if I get sick or injured I won’t run it, but I will cover one mile at least.

The idea started when I was in Bolivia last year and a girl in the house said she had been doing this for years.  She was a super fast runner and was in amazing shape, and when I brought it up to a friend, he had heard of others making this same commitment.  Apparently there’s other people online who have come up with all kinds of rules for this, like being in full running gear for that mile to qualify.

I’m turning 28 next week and figure it’ll be a good point to start so that in the future I can count up how many years I’ve kept up the commitment.  Plus once you do get into full running gear, it’s pretty easy to just go ahead and do a full workout.  The bonus of committing to just one mile is that I can use it as a warmup for a weightbuilding workout, so if I did a long run the day before I can still stay active the next day.  Last week I ran 13.1 on Monday but felt like doing something Tuesday, so I walked around the San Diego Zoo for a few hours.

This is kinda scary to go out there and publicly announce, as I hope to really stick to it!  I will cover one mile minimum every day!!  I know it’ll be hard on days that I’m really stressed, sick, injured, etc. but I hope to stay motivated by knowing it’s an inevitability, just another part of your routine.  Like brushing your teeth, emptying the trash, or cooking dinner.  I’m not looking forward to this but I know I’ll thank myself later

Sometimes I wonder if regret really should exist. It has such a negative connotation! What’s the point? Why wish for something to be different when you can’t change it? My philosophy is to learn from that mistake and to be a better person for it. If it hadn’t happened to you, you wouldn’t be the older, wiser, person you are now. Why take that away from yourself?

Granted, I’m sure we have all done things or been subject to/victims of things you can spend a lifetime turning over in your head, contemplating the multitude of alternative realities we could be living instead. My question is, what is the benefit to you now from this exercise… does it help you be less concerned? Less stressed? Does it relax you to mull over “might have beens?” In most cases, the answer is “no.”

Therefore I am putting out the idea that regret may not be something to hold in high regard. In fact, maybe we should discard it altogether. Reviewing my life, there could be things I look back on as things I regret. Only I don’t.  In fact, I feel this idea has helped me live every day to the fullest, so there is no regret.  All options have been exhausted, as in “I did all I could.”  What more can anyone ask of you than your best?  And if you don’t measure up, call it a mistake… you suffer the consequences, and you learn from it.

I have made mistakes, but they made me who I am. I am better for them. I am who I am for them. And I’m OK with that. Thus I don’t regret.