What is accomplishment?

My 5K race is this Sunday. I have not yet run 5K on the road, but I’ve been using the treadmills at the hotels I stay at while traveling for my day job. I just cranked out my first ever 5 kilometers or 3.1 miles. It’s supposed to be much easier on a treadmill than on the road, but I am still feeling pretty good about it. If you are interested at all in starting to run then I highly recommend www.marathonrookie.com. They give you complete training schedules and can also hook you up with all the races around the nation if you want to enter a run.

Going from very poor cardiac condition to 5K ready in five weeks also got me thinking about accomplishment. The running website also gave me the following quote to think about when it got hard to get motivated to run.

"Now if you are going to win any battle you have to do one thing. You have to make the mind run the body. Never let the body tell the mind what to do. The body will always give up. It is always tired in the morning, noon, and night. But the body is never tired if the mind is not tired."
- George S. Patton, U.S. Army General, 1912 Olympian.

It’s always easier to do nothing than it is to make a choice to change. Despite the difficult nature of making such a decision and putting in the effort to see it through comes the sense of self gratification. I apply this to my own life with both the running and the Sailing for SOS project. I’ve never been happy with my career choice, but despite that it’s extremely hard to carve out a new path. I know so many people who hate what they do, but choose the security of the known over taking a chance to try something different that might bring happiness. One smart lady put it this way.

“Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end. It's not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it's when you've had everything to do, and you've done it. “
- Margaret Thatcher

Whatever it is you want to do, make a plan to make it a reality and take action on that plan. It’s amazing how quickly you’ll find energy to give the project you never knew you had. I guess it’s a quote day. One last one to finish off.

“Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe