Being Badass

I'm feeling rather triumphant this week.  Maybe it was having a lot of friends gathering at various times over the weekend, or pulling off a couple awesome parties despite 2 feet of snow falling, or getting in good workouts, or eating well, or having hit a major milestone, or just feeling lighthearted for the most part.  I dunno.

But this morning, I woke up angry and weepy for no apparent reason.  I ran late due to time spent simmering over petty stuff.  I almost skipped my workout, even though I had decided the night before to go for three miles on the treadmill since I committed to a 5K in early February and would like to reduce my time it takes to run that.

Still, I showed up, texting my assistant I would be late for work and hoping I could sweat out the grouchy.

I fell behind immediately as I ran into a friend and we chatted for about the first ten minutes I was on the treadmill.  As I started running, 5 minutes in had a full blown asthma attack such that I had to stop completely, be more angry and unhappy, regain my ability to breathe, think about just giving up and going home, deciding that no matter how f-ing long it took I was by all that is holy going to finish three miles, restart the treadmill and hit my 2012 theme song on my ipod and reboot.  I forwarded past any song that didn't make me want to dance.

Self care this morning meant paying attention to what was going on with me, doing what was possible, and not letting my own attitude defeat me.

I walked much of the rest of it.  With about a 3/4 mile to go I burst into a run because I wanted to run, not because I felt I had to or felt bad about walking so much.  In the process of just moving my feet and listening to happy music, I felt happier and calmer.  I finished the three miles in a much different mental space than I started with.  I actually grinned at people as I walked toward the locker room.

I felt pretty badass not because I conquered a task.  I conquered myself.