So Much For Consistency

The activity app on my phone reminds me every day that most of my trends are heading downward. Less distance covered each day. Less exercise minutes and fewer movement-related calories burned. Apparently my standing minutes are down, and my runs are getting slower too. And I think just to make me feel better, the app has a note for me that says my arrow may be down, but my cardio vascular fitness is still considered superior.

That’s not all. More than two months ago, I returned to writing feverishly for one week and published that I was committed to improving my consistency. Then, I successfully turned in two of the last ten weeks worth of assignments. It’s my project and there are no grades, but still. No matter how true I want that commitment to be, I wasn’t yet confident that I would be able to deliver. I’m still committed, even if the timeline isn’t as short as I hoped it would be.

So much for consistency, right?

All of these things are true. I haven’t been prioritizing running or writing as much lately, and that’s really the catalyst for all of the downward trends and missed Tuesdays. I’ve been busy, and tired. And this spring that has felt like perpetual winter hasn’t helped me practice the discipline I usually do. So, the trends are true, and they are what they are. But they are an incomplete snapshot of the whole picture. 

My legs aren’t sharp and I can’t throw down a fast 5k right now, but I’m not actually getting much slower. Less miles run overall just means that I don’t have as many logged without the dog sniff pauses. My watch doesn’t know the difference though. It’s also been mostly planning season at work, so my job is missing its typical physicality.

I am writing every day, even if it isn’t the kind of writing I typically share here. My daily word count is going towards proposals, training documents, and presentations. It’s spent refining multiple drafts to get something precise enough, writing who knows how many hundreds of emails, and jotting notes to myself in margins or on scraps of paper. And when I finish for the the day? The last thing I want to do is keep staring at my computer. So, writing’s been tough.

Yes. When I find my way back to consistency, I’m going to be a little rusty. It may take a few weeks for running to feel smooth or easy again. It will take a few weeks longer for the pop-feel of quick turnover in my legs to return. And getting a few hundred words I’ve written for me to a place where I feel satisfied enough to press publish will take significantly more time than it did a year ago. But with a little patience and discipline, I know I’ll get faster again.

The thing is, there have to be dips. There have to be times when we are taking a down step. Despite what we want to believe, continuous improvement is a bit of a fallacy and never linear.

Training happens in blocks. You start from wherever you are, and you build and build as best as you can until you reach your performance peak. Typically there is a specific race or season that shapes a training block, so you only have a set amount of time to peak. Once your block ends, you take some downtime before starting another. How much downtime depends on a lot of factors. But rolling into another block without respite is the easiest way end up sidelined.

It’s not peak then valley, although sometimes your trajectory or performance in a specific block will feel that way. It’s peak, then replenish. The block itself will require a lot of focused energy. When you’re in it, and you reach the part of constant fatigue where you’re always hungry, what keeps you moving forward is knowing it’s part of a cycle. That soon you’ll reach your taper, and then you’ll find out how much the effort you’ve put in will pay off.

I think life is the same way. When fatigue has a specific purpose or end date, it’s energizing to keep going and push through it. To stay disciplined long enough that you’re able to see what’s possible. The common term these days is labelling it as some form of grinding. Keeping your nose to the grindstone and all the equivalents. But you can’t grind forever without breaks or replenishment. And when we try? Well, that’s why we have the term burnout.

With life though, it isn’t grinding through one training block at a time. Life is a balancing act of multiple priorities, each with their own training blocks and timelines. They all overlap and it’s constantly messy. Whenever we focus extra attention on one, a different one will be neglected. But we do the best way can, and we figure it out as we go.

Consistency will come back with discipline. I’ll need to prioritize running and writing more often for it to happen, but I know I’ll get there. And when I do, I won’t be focused on where I used to be. I’ll focus on where I’m heading.