Pacing Myself

I've decided to accept a challenge from my lovely, brilliant wife. She's been recommending that I blog about pacing myself. You see, I have a problem with charging blindly through things. It's not as if I am not enjoying them, I am. I really, really am. I suppose I should back up a little and give examples of what I rush through.

Eating, drinking, shopping, driving, walking, running, playing games. Well, I am hoping that you get the picture.

So, my brilliant one suggests this challenge; try to learn to pace myself and I should document it here on this blog. I don't really have anything else going on here. I've had a few good entries, but seriously, there's nothing much here to hold the attention of many people. I resisted for a long time. I'm still not even completely sure I'm on board. I move fast. I don't know why. I used to move slowly and methodic, well, let's not be silly, I have never done much methodically, but I remember my older brother and a friend of his talking about how I use to walk so slowly and coolly. I guess you could say cocky. Yes, I used to be a seriously cocky kid. I'm not sure what gave me the attitude, but I had it. I don't know when I lost that attitude either. I don't know if there was some traumatic event that I have buried deep in me psyche or it was puberty, or what, but one day I was slow moving Joe Cool and the next day I was in Full Time Fast Forward (FTFF).

As I said, I don't know what prompted this change, but it happened, and I just accepted it. Here's an example of my FTFF. Eating Oreos. I am not a pull them apart, lick the icing, eat the cookies kind of guy. I go for the whole cookie in one bite. CHOMP. Gone and gone. Good and good. Right? Right. So, why would I want to pace myself with this?

I think I got my first taste of pacing and how it could be beneficial this summer. I was "training" to run the Peachtree Road Race. Training means going out and trying to run so I wouldn't die while doing the actual event. Every time before this summer that I have tried to go running I have tried to run like I did when I was a junior in college and could go for several miles at a good pace. Needless to say I never made it far, and I always felt like my heart would bust out of my chest from beating so hard. So for some reason this summer I decide to slow down a little and just, you know, jog. Well low and behold, I was able to run for 20 straight minutes without stopping, and when I did stop I didn't feel Death was tapping me on the shoulder asking me to dance. I ran several times during that outing and when I got home I was amazed. AMAZED I tell you. So I begin to think that maybe there was something to this pacing thing afterall. I'm not sure why I doubted the idea. My life would generally be easier if I just went along with her ideas.

So, here's my plan; I'm going to try some experiments over the course of the school year on pacing, and I will post those experiments and the results here. I am going to try once a week, every other week at most. I think I can make it entertaining enough for you, but if not just think, you won't have wasted any money, just time.

First up - Eating.