Advice

Three years ago when I began the journey to becoming a teacher, I was given all kinds of advice...

Don't be nice the first week of school. Don't eat lunch in the teacher's lounge. Don't smile too much. All kinds of crazy stuff. But, in all the weird advice I did receive two nuggets of wisdom that have really stuck with me.

The first, "fake it til you make it." In other words, pretend you know exactly what you're doing even if you have no clue. Or, pretend that you are really having an amazing day and that you love your students so much. Then, eventually, you won't have to pretend anymore. I don't feel like I've done too much "faking" it in my short teaching career, at least with the liking the students part, but this advice has remained steadily in my mind.

The other, "make it a game, even if it's not." I think you could probably say that I live by this one. We make a game out of walking to lunch, taking a restroom break, you name it, it can be a game - even if it's really not!

Anyway, the point is, I have found that not only does the "game" mentality work on the kids (it keeps them focused and gives them little time to make a wrong choice), it totally works on ME! I'm just a touch competitive, just a little tiny bit. :)

As you are probably well aware, I've been running for a couple months now. I have been loving my NIKE+ iPod thing and all that comes with it. Well, one of the neatest things you can do is challenge people all over the world - or just your friends - to run the most miles, run the most often, run the fastest, burn the most calories, etc. You name it, you can challenge someone to do it. This week I entered my first challenge against 30 other runners. I am currently in 8th place, which I'm pretty happy with. I found myself a little more motivated to push myself and get more miles in, but really I just didn't want to finish last. :)

I also entered another challenge this week that has found me pushing myself to even more miles. My good friend Kristy and I are challenging each other to run the most miles in 14 days. I believe we are 6 days in and while I'm behind at the moment (and will probably remain), I have never had more fun enduring such extreme torture! I'm totally motivated to run everyday and for longer periods of time.

I did 5.25 miles yesterday along the Trinity River that left my legs in not so good shape today, but I made myself at least do something tonight. While I was enjoying a brief run around the block, this verse came to mind:

"Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed."
Ecclesiastes 4:9 (NLT)

And, while I'm not exactly sure that making a game out of running was what King Solomon had in mind when he penned that so many years ago, it is totally true for me. We'll probably both hate running by next Monday but we'll have had two weeks of lots of miles! Thanks for playing along Kristy!