By Stephanie Gardner
While travelling as the director of an international film project, I decided to take up running.
I was in Skopje, North Macedonia and after having been “on the road” for nearly three years, I started to feel less healthy, less in control of my own body and sometimes stressed out.
My late father was an amateur runner, and I always remember thinking how healthy he was, even into old age, and I felt the daily running was a major factor in this. Perhaps my desire to run was also to find a new connection to a father I loved and recently lost.
But where does one find the time or energy to run, especially after days of filming and travelling from location to location?
Then, while in Zimbabwe, I met Thandie Mawungwa, a woman my age with more responsibilities on her plate as an accomplished writer and film producer and mother of young children. I was in awe of her determination to run and her dedication to her own goals as a woman in control of her destiny. Thandie helped inspire me to fully take on my desires to run.
It took me a while to get into the habit of running, but while in Skopje, my boyfriend gifted me a Garmin watch with all the bells and whistles, and while not necessarily for everyone, I have to admit that psychologically, this watch helped me tremendously with my work out plans and sticking to it. I guess I’m just the kind of person who needs goals and it helps when someone (or something) tells me what to do! As a film director, I make hundreds of decisions every day, and when it comes to things outside of work, I find it helpful when I don’t have to make extra personal decisions, such as when and how to run.
So, through the watch, I set a goal for myself: first, to run a 5K. Based on my performance in each workout, my watch’s 5K training plan gave me new workouts for the following week.
Soon, I was hooked on the running exercises. I enjoyed the time alone to think (or not), or to just observe life go by. I would run along Skopje’s river and through the city streets, watching life go by. The more distance I covered, the more areas of the city I would see that otherwise, I’d never have noticed or thought to visit. I felt like I was finally seeing the places I was travelling to from a new perspective.
It was in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, where I ran my first 5K. I did not do it as part of an organized race, I just asked around for where a nice place to run would be and ran the 5K myself. I was nervous about it, but by the end, I was full of adrenaline having completed it faster than I expected, and less winded too. I was hooked, and after a couple of days of rest, decided to start training for my first 10K.
One thing I’ve realized about myself is, that I like to run fast. I feel most at peace, most natural when I’m running faster rather than at a slower pace or jog. Granted, I realize that “fast” is a relative term. But training for a 10K, especially since I’ve never done one before, takes endurance and it can be foolish to try to run too fast.
When I chose my first 10K training plan, I chose to train for endurance rather than speed. After all, I just wanted to finish the race! Often, however, while running, I found myself having to tell myself to slow down.
We live in a high-speed century. When I was a kid, I liked sports; I liked to be fast; and when I had a goal, I thought it had to be achieved immediately to be successful.
Now, as I age, I try to take my time, pay attention to details, and perform for longevity rather than for immediate rewards. Especially in my industry (film and TV entertainment), consumers want things right away. The faster you can get a film to the box office or streaming, the quicker the dollars can come in and then society moves on to the next thing.
With my current project, I started out wanting to do a very ambitious goal in a year’s time. I was going to travel to 33 countries and meet 33 filmmakers and film 33 episodes of a 33 minute TV series to go straight to an audience around the world. Not only is this insanely ambitious, but as we started travelling for the project and meeting other filmmakers and filming their lives, careers and cultures, I realized how important this cross-cultural project was to me, and how I did not want to rush it. Rather, I wanted to do it in a meaningful way that will have a lasting impact, not just when it first hits TV or streaming, but when people revisit it in years to come. And for this, you need time, energy, and endurance.
As I trained for my first 10K, I thought about all these things, and I kept remembering the story from my childhood of the “tortoise and the hare.” In this fable, the tortoise and the hare run a race. The hare is quite cocky because he knows that physically he is much faster than the tortoise. It’s a sure-fire bet that the hare will win the race. So the hare runs ahead at the start of the race and gets so far ahead that he starts goofing off, taking his time, and stops to chat with friends, meanwhile, the tortoise trudges forwards, slowly, but consistently, one step at a time, getting a little further and a little further as he goes. The hare loses track of time, and the tortoise’s steady pace, consistency and determination get him across the finish line first, winning the race against all odds.
As a kid, I think I was more like the hare. Now, as an adult, when I can look more clearly into the future I hope to have for myself and work, I can see the appeal of the tortoise. Sure, I’ll still sprint every once in a while, but I’m in it to win it, not just once and done and forgotten, but with substance and the motive to keep going over and over and over again.
Running has helped me not only feel healthier, and better about myself physically, but it has given me the time and space to see a clearer picture of my own life and personal endeavours and I am grateful to the sport and those who have supported me along the way, for this opportunity to continue to better myself.
The challenges of running my first10K include the fact that I ran it at a much higher altitude than when I first started training. For most of my three-month 10K training plan (while I was on the road), I was running at sea level. I returned to my home in northern New Mexico just three weeks before I had scheduled my personal 10K run. Adjusting to the altitude, and running at more extreme elevations was extra challenging, as mostly I had been running on flat, straight courses before. It forced me to slow down even more and focus on endurance. I was so proud after completing this first 10K at an altitude of 8,000 feet!
Eventually, I intend to train for a half marathon, but first I decided to train for a second 10K, this time with the goal of running a faster race. Okay, maybe the “hare” is still inside me, but at least I know my inner tortoise is there to guide me, too.
To all of you considering taking up running, I encourage you to try it; test your limits; and maybe like me, the more you run, the more you’ll want to keep running! The possibilities are boundless and a new adventure awaits around every corner!
Happy trails!