Four days later I was still suffering and struggling through planned training sessions that I should have been nailing. Schoolboy error.
When I mentioned this faux-pas to more experienced athletes, I got knowing looks, wry smiles and was delivered the line, “don’t think, just do.”
Not thinking used to be a bit of an issue for me. I tend to mull things over. A lot. It is probably the main reason why I opted to become part of a coaching set up in the first place. I was paralysed by a myriad of training regimes, plans, articles, blogs, magazines all suggesting polar opposites. I eventually (after a lot of thinking) decided once I had committed to the Melbourne Ironman in early 2015, that it would be best to trust someone to help me work through all of the options. I teamed up with a coach.
By saying, “don’t think, just do” the more experienced athletes reinforced the need to trust the coach, the process and the plan. After all, it was me who took the time and effort to get and pay for a coach. Why would I then go and ignore them?
A few weeks on, with lesson learnt and words of wisdom taken on board, I trusted the process that was laid out for me, which was extremely liberating. I now realise the unbelievable amount of energy that I spent thinking and agonising over training plans for the Helsinki, Boston, Canberra and Melbourne marathons in years gone by. So wasteful.
Not over-thinking is yielding results in my own training and giving me the head space to turn my attention over to other aspects of life, which is no bad thing. I am now attempting to deliver on my own coaching aspirations and a long held promise to be a better cook!
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