So all in all, in life when you find whatever it is that you love to do make sure you enjoy it, and it is something that you are motivated to do because with motivation will follow hard work and the wanting to push yourself to become better. And when you put forth the time and effort you will notice the payoff.

Motivation

I feel that running is a positive experience that can be carried over to real life situations. Don't get me wrong, I know other athletes like basketball players, football players, ect. work hard, but those are team sports where you have to rely on other players. Cross country and track you can be scored as a team, but most times you are more worried about how you place individually because it is how you do as an individual you get the most satisfaction from your hard work.
I feel in life I am already really motivated and active to do things. I think the motivation just comes naturally due to the fact you have to be motivated enough to get up and run everyday that everything else seems like a peace of cake.
picture: http://blogs.wayne.edu/jaimie/files/2009/08/running.jpg

Hard work deserves praise. Hard work is also allowed to have fun and enjoy itself, but that doesn't mean you need to get distracted and loose focus on what you have worked so hard for. For me, as you all may know, I am very satisfied with where my training is taking me right now and I am really focused. But there is one thing coming up that i am worried i might loose focus on my training, Spring Break.
For spring break I am going to Florida. I knew it would be hard to run down there and do my workouts so I decided to surround myself with a positive environment. I am going down with some friends from the Cross country team. I know that we all won't let each other get too lazy because coach has emailed us our workout plan for the week and we need to stick to it. Sure i had a great indoor season, don't i deserve a break? Of course, but taking that time off would be the worst thing to do since i want to stay in shape for outdoor. It is so much easier to get out of shape than into it. Most people don't realize that you can loose a lot of fitness from 3-5 days.
So like i said, work hard... have fun.... relax.... but stay focused.
Picture: http://www.usatourist.com/photos/florida/florida1b.jpg

This entry today is more of a reflection from all my hard work that I have talked about in my past blogs. Yesterday was the my last indoor meet for the season before outdoor and I noticed a huge payoff yesterday. Coach put me in the mile. We were at Anderson University for the Fred Wilt Memorial Invitational. I have always been decent at the mile, but has never been my favorite race. I love the two mile more because i can run just fast enough the entire two miles, but not too fast. The mile is a ridiculously fast race and it takes a lot of guts to run it. In high school it felt like i was stuck at 4:44 and was never going to go faster, but i put in over 400 miles in over the summer and coaches workouts in cross country and track really helped me achieve what happened yesterday.
I headed out into the cold weather for my 2 mile warm up. It was a pretty big meet, but i wasn't nervous because i've been to my fair share of big meets and it is what i train for. I knew i would do decent, but i didn't think i was going to do anything special. I knew the record was 4:33 and i wanted to go for it. I had just ran a 4:35 mile split two weeks ago at all-ohio for the Distance Medley Relay (which is 1200, 400, 800 , 1600). I was in the third and fastest heat of the mile. When the gun went off I started off in second and as people started passing me I noticed i was in 6th place, but wasn't slowing up. They were speeding up. With four more laps i decided to go around the pack and push the pace. I don't know where it came from, but i had a lot of energy and felt good. I had some internal conflict. My mind was saying, "What are you doing these guys are fast." But my body said, "you're and animal... you feel great.... go for it all." When the last lap came around i went into a full sprint. I only got pasted by one guy so i received second in my heat with a 4:27.
I was shocked, that was a personal record by 15 seconds in an open mile (not the distance medly relay) and picked up my fourth record at defiance by 6 seconds. The best part about it was looking at the finals sheet seeing that the top 5 runners, not including me, were all seniors. So that was a great feeling knowing that all my hard work at practice and on workouts payed off.
Picture: http://www.defianceathletics.com/mtrackfield/photos/147/2328/

Eating right

I know with all this talk about pushing your self, working hard and exercising makes me sound like a crazed health person. I am not going to lie, I really try and focus on taking care of my body. I really try to eat healthy and stay hydrated and a huge factor with why I do this is working out. I have pretty much accepted I am going to be running year round for the next three years of my college career with cross country, indoor and outdoor track. So if I am working out every day and putting up sixty mile weeks then what is the point of drinking pop or eating at Mcdonald's if it is just going to hurt my body and set me back from what I have already gained. I can tell a difference to. If I am not eating right I feel terrible on our workout days which could be anything to a 2 mile warm up and cool down with mile repeats between or a ladder where we start off with a 400 meter to an 800 to a 1200 to a 1600 and back down. So needless to say I would rather feel good on these workouts and finish them on time hitting my paces rather than cramping up and having dietary issues.
Picture: http://s4.hubimg.com/u/61463_f260.jpg

I have taken a few classes on psychology, and one of the causes of obesity is linked to depression. When a person becomes depressed they tend to take comfort in eating food all the time which temporarily releases a hormone to make them feel better. What people need to realize is that exercise is a stress reliever which also releases hormones that can increase a persons mood. I understand that exercise isn't always fun, and when most people think exercise they think running which scares most people away. However if everyone would just take the time to find activities they like then so many people would be much healthier. I think a big reason people avoid exercise is because they're scared of the pain and the hard work, but isn't it worth it to be happy with yourself and healthy? I may never fully understand the reasons why people let themselves go like they do, but if they would just take the time to attempt a healthier lifestyle then they themselves could be a happier person.
Picture: http://weblogs.cltv.com/features/health/livinghealthy/working%20out.jpg

Throughout my life my friends have all been pretty athletic, or atleast very outgoing when we would hang out. Over the summer all I did was prepare for college life; I focused on running and getting ready for a career. Once I got to college I immediately bonded with the other people on the team, however once classes started I found myself getting annoyed by those people around me who had nothing going on in their lives. There's always those people who seem to have nothing to do, all they do is eat, take classes, and sit in their dorms. I don't have a problem with working hard for an education, but what's the point in working hard for a job when all your ever going to do is sit in your home after you get off work, how can you possibly be happy? I'm not saying you shouldn't work hard, I'm saying you need to incorporate other aspects into your life. Athletics is such a huge part of my life and I feel it should be a part of everyones life, it always makes me feel better after a good work out, and when im happy everyone around me seems to be happier as well. I also have no sympathy for those who don't do anything, but all they ever do is complain about their problems, if it's that bad then get up and fix it.
Picture: http://www.motivator-generator.com/data/lazy_people.png