Running is hard, but is it fun?

What is it about running that we do it? We run endless miles, we sweat, we exhaust and injure ourselves, and yet we keep doing it. Why?

There was an article in the July, 2016 issue of Runners World by Jonathan Beverly titled "Pleasure and Pain" (I can't find a link to it - I'll add it when I finally find one) where he explored to concept of whether or not running was supposed to be fun or something else. The article starts out with a co-worker, having learned that he had recently run a 10K event, asked him if he had had fun. And that's where it starts. Are we having fun running?

I like running, but does that make it "fun". The word "fun" doesn't sound like the right description - I think perhaps "rewarding" might better describe it.

When I think of "fun", I'm conjuring up something that won't hurt me or exhaust me. Maybe even make me laugh. Do we have fun when we go to the gym and push a bunch of weights around? Kind of the same thing, isn't it? It's not "fun", but yet it feels good. But maybe feeling good is what "fun" is...

When my non-runner friends ask me why I run, I feel that I have to justify my activity. They aren't runners mostly because it requires a level of effort that they aren't prepared to make - they may have tried it in the past and discovered that it wasn't "fun" in a traditional sense, but never persevered to the point of feeling the "reward" for having done so.

So I wind up having a variety of explanations:
- It's an excellent cardio/vascular exercise
- It helps me unwind
- It helps me manage my blood pressure
- It helps me manage my blood sugar levels
- It's "me" time
- and so on...  and not once do I mention that "it a fun thing to do...".

I run because I enjoy the effort and the motion of running, but probably my favorite part is the feeling afterwards. I love that flush feeling that results from the recovery from being exhausted. It's like an internal glow.

And perhaps all runners need to confess that running is, at least a little bit, masochistic. I quite frankly have no other way to explain why I would run a bunch of miles in hot, humid weather and then look forward to doing it again the next day.

Jonathan Beverly mentions runner Mark Rowlands in his article and a hill that Rowlands liked to run, if for no other reason than to prove to himself that he still could. Do to do so was a sense of accomplishment, while realizing that one day, the hill would win. Accomplishing that feat (beating the hill) made it "fun" for him.

I've never won a race, and while it is likely that I never will, I don't stop trying, if for no other reason than the fact that I believe that I could win. As Beverly writes, I will push myself beyond my body's distress signals for no other reason than satisfying my internal determination to try. And for some crazy reason in my head, I like that and repeat this effort time and time again. So because I do it, and because I choose to do it repeatedly, does that make it "fun"?

So I think that the short answer to all this is Yes. Yes, it is fun because we find it rewarding, and in that reward we find pleasure, and so therefore, if we find it pleasurable, ergo, it is "fun".
'Nuff said...