It’s been a good six weeks since I managed to do any exercise at all: with illness and new jobs and life, this vital part of my own self-care has been missing. I hadn’t really realised how much I had missed it – I’m not someone who looks forward to exercise. It’s only when I’m doing it (sometimes) and after I’ve done it (mostly this) that I remember why anyone would want to run about.
It became a block – it was never the right time, I always felt unwell, or it was raining. As with many things, especially mental health, the first step is the hardest. The whole task can be overwhelming, the goal too unreachable, the pain too great. And it is hard to stay in the moment, not to hark back to how far or fast you used to run, to how much you could once achieve or manage. It’s been the same with writing my blog – once the habit became hard to maintain, it became ever harder to put finger to key and make something where once there was empty space. The fear of being inadequate looms large and can trap us in very deep ruts.
But the hopeful message of my slow and wheezing 20 minutes run, is that once you can take that first step, and shake even for a moment the shackles of the past or the fears of the future, you are free. Free to be whatever it is you are right now, and that is enough for today, for you.
Whilst these words might not be world-changing or even good, they are there. They exist and the next time they will be easier to find. Words and steps can feel impossible to find when you are silent and still. But one step leads to the next, one word heralds another.