Running With The Rabbit and Other Ways To Defeat Running Boredom

The following is a guest post from Charlene Jaszewski, a fellow runner and resident of New York City. This is a great post about a problem that most of us deal with from time to time. Make sure to leave a comment at the end of the post.

If you’re like me (and god help you if you are), your number one problem on a run is not coming up with enough energy to complete your run, it’s keeping your mind from going crazy during the run. If you’re just running 45 minutes, it’s easy enough to keep your mind entertained with scenery on the way out and back. But once you start pushing your mileage up up and away, it becomes more important for you to keep your brain in check.  Here are some methods I use.

1. Listen to fast music.

If you listen to the iPod Nano, you can define a “Power Song” that you can pull up in those instances where you need an extra kick.

2. Do a mantra.

Mantras are words repeated during meditation to calm and control the mind. I discovered mantras during a failed attempt at a meditation practice. However, I found by accident that a speeded-up mantra DOES work while running. Obviously “OM” doesn’t work for this purpose, but the Hare Krishna one does. It goes like this:

Hare krishna hare krishna
krishna krishna hare hare
hare rama hare rama
rama rama hare hare

3. Find a rabbit

Here’s how it works. Run in an area with other folks (easy enough to do in the city where I live) – in your sights, find someone who is running ahead of you, but JUST A HAIR FASTER. He/she is your rabbit. Make it a challenge to catch up to them. If you’re feeling ballsy, you can even try to pass them, but don’t get too cocky. And don’t make it apparent that you’re chasing them or you might creep them out. Then again if you do, they will run away faster, creating an even greater challenge for you.

One recent rabbit and I did a speed/up slowdown for almost 45 minutes – I would catch up to/pass them, then when I would slow down, they would speed up/pass me. Glorious! And unless your rabbit is extraordinarily cute and you want to have a post-rabbit conversation, you don’t even need to say “thanks for being my rabbit.”

4. Cityzagging:

*Only to be undertaken by the very agile and quick, requires dense population and wide sidewalks

Part of my run home involves three long city blocks near Central Park. The sidewalks are very wide (10-15 ft) and there are pockets of people every 20 feet. While running home, it’s necessary to zig and zag between people to keep up my pace. But now instead of zigging when I have to, I CREATE zigzag situations. Like a pocket of people only five feet spread instead of ten.  It’s really fun because not only do i get the workout benefit of varying my speed, I get the mental challenge of estimating the ideal speed/trajectory to avoid plowing people over.

Charlene Jaszewski is a freelance communication optimizer who lives in New York City a stone’s throw from Central Park, just the way she likes it. You can read her thoughts on social media, usability and randomness at www.theredheadsaid.com.