Sunday, January 10, 2016

Life: Keeping Up The Pace

Sometimes I'm not sure which is more challenging, training for a marathon or raising kids while maintaining relationships with friends and hanging on to my sanity.

It seems that as my children get older, the pace of life keeps getting faster and faster, and there are times when it really feels like I can't keep up. That was the case last week. Between basketball practices, church youth group, long work days, and just life in general, there were very few waking hours when my entire family was home together. Add that to the fact that my husband left today to work out of town for the beginning of the week, and I was left feeling pretty stressed out and uncomfortable with the lack of family time. 

Because of that, I ended up backing out of plans with my friends on Saturday night. I HATE IT WHEN PEOPLE BACK OUT OF PLANS. I really do. And I try hard not to make a commitment to something unless I know for sure that I can be there, but this was a case of not being able to keep up with the pace of my life. I needed to back off and slow down in order to regain a sense of control and peace. So, that's what I did. I cancelled my plans so that I could stay home and have a night with my family before my husband headed out of town. 

And it was definitely the right choice. 

Taking the time to slow down and catch my breath was just what I needed to recharge.

I thought about that a lot on my run Saturday afternoon. I had a 6 mile run at an 8:42 pace listed on my training plan, and I was lucky enough to get to run outside...and it was 47 degrees! An 8:42 pace is faster than I've been running lately. Honestly, I haven't even paid attention to how fast I've been running since last May. So, this run was pretty hard. My body apparently forgot how to hold a steady pace when I'm not running on the treadmill.

Every time I felt like I was running too fast, I'd look at my watch to see that I was, indeed, running much faster that I should have been. Then, I'd slow down, get lost in thought, feel like I was probably running too slow, and check my watch again to see that I was, indeed, running too slow. It literally went on like that for the entire 6 miles. 

It was exhausting not being able to find my rhythm and just hold it. 

And that is life.

There are times when it feels like we're going too fast, and it's because we are. We need to take the time to slow down and enjoy the journey.


And then there are times when it may seem like life is a bit mundane and not full of the experiences we want. Those are the moments when we reevaluate our goals and often realize that we're not doing what we need to to reach them. 

It's all a balancing act, and it takes a lot of time and practice to find your rhythm and then hold it. But it can be done.

Sparkle.Pounce.Keep The Pace.

-Kendra

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