Running Part 1 – A Good Reason is the Best Requirement

Latest Posts  •  January 19, 2021

Regular exercise and physical fitness are important aspects of our health. Regular exercise can prevent or positively influence many diseases. However, this only works if you approach your fitness training correctly. On the one hand, this includes a certain regularity of the training and on the other hand, a correct execution. In this article, I will show you how the resolution to run can become a real habit.

A Good Reason as a First Step

There are many good reasons to start running (or do any other sport). And a good reason is an important first step in turning a resolution into a habit. Without a good reason, you won’t be able to achieve your goals.

First of all, you need to ask yourself why you want to go running. Do you sit a lot during your occupation, at university or at school and need a little more exercise? Do you want to strengthen your cardiovascular system? Do you want to lose a little weight? As with everything in life, it’s important to have or develop a good reason to reach a goal, otherwise you will not keep up and failure is inevitable.

The Wheel of Life can help you figure out some reasons to start running.

The Right Strategy Makes the Difference

It all comes down to the right strategy in order to develop a new habit.

Steven R. Covey established a simple model that is easy to internalize and implement.

Covey describes habits as the intersection of

• desire
• skills
• and knowledge.

The desire means that you want to go running because you have recognized it as something you should do. It is the first motivation for action. The desire thus corresponds to the reason for which you want to establish a habit. According to the Covey model, a good reason is one of the three prerequisites for a good habit.

The desire – as mentioned above – is determined individually. Running is more than just putting one foot in front of the other and doing it as fast as possible. What do you want to achieve? Endurance, speed, health, a better overall feeling?…

But as most of you know from experience, just the desire to do something is rarely enough to turn the resolution into a habit. And this is where skills and knowledge come into play. And this is where a lot can go wrong.

With the Right Skills & the Right Knowledge to the Goal

Many people just start running because it’s not that complicated.

Running pants, running shirt, running shoes and off you go.

You probably also know people who have taken this step at some point and then after a few months, they did not develop a new habit as well as a routine.

These people often say that running is not for them, that their knees hurt, that they can’t breathe well. Or that they already suffer from extreme muscle soreness after their first run so they have to stop for two or three days. After that, the initial spark is gone.

In these cases, skills and knowledge were neglected. This is where the wheat quickly separates from the chaff. Between the people who start running but then stop shorty after and those who persevere for years and achieve success.

The first step for a long-term implementation of a good resolution would therefore not be to simply start running but to take a closer look at the project first. Buy new running shoes, create a running plan, possibly go to the doctor for a health check-up and purchase a heart rate monitor.

The “how” is just as important as the “why”
for a long-term success in running. 

For me, running was not a daily routine until 25 years ago, because I often had some sport of pain in my knee while running, once even a bursitis. I approximately ran once or twice a month, other than that, I did some strength training in the gym or went mountain biking.

Then I attended the seminar Creativity and Peak Performance and Slim and Fit Forever by the German running pope Dr. Ulrich Strunz.

Attending this seminar became my reason for running every day. No matter where I am in this world and no matter if it is raining, snowing or extremely hot.

The subject of my next blog article will be how I managed to do this as well as the concrete knowledge and skills you need to have in order to start running.

2021-01-19T15:36:27+00:00January 19th, 2021|

One Comment

  1. Steffen January 21, 2021 at 12:18 am - Reply

    Hallo Hans-Peter, als Personaler, Drummer, Ex-Schüler von Dir meine Gratulation zu den tollen Beiträgen, ich habe auch erst vor 2 Jahren mit dem Laufen angefangenund jetzt mit 53, will ich es nicht mehr missen denn es gibt mir so viel. Auch wenn ich nicht jeden Tag laufe, sondern max 3 x die Woche um die Knochen nicht zu überlasten, ist es ein echtes habit geworden und tut mir wahnsinnig gut, körperlich, menta und natütlich auch für meine drumming fitness! Ich hoffe, Du spielst auch noch, liebe grüße, Steffen

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