Who Do You Love?

Lately I've been thinking a lot about self esteem and what it actually means. It's the so-called love you have for yourself. But it's always been a blurry, grayish area for me. I believe in self love, absolutely. But I also know far too many people who suffer from high self esteem as opposed to the low. There must be a way to love yourself without being a self centered, ego maniacal douche bag who can only talk about how much better they are than everyone else around them. My own confidence took quite a hit when I couldn't run without excruciating pain and then found out I had stress fractures and had to stop running for a while. I felt like a failure... Like perhaps I should have tried harder to run through the pain and that I was using it as an excuse not to accomplish my goals. Sometimes it's hard to remember why I started all of this to begin with. I remember that it was for me, but aside from that I just don't know. I've gotten support from my husband who's always there to help me. He provides a lot of physical support (i.e. rides along beside me, gives me water, cold towels, times me, gives me distance readings, provides motivational support when I'm tired and want to quit) but he doesn't jump up and shout how great I am when I'm done. My parents and friends find my running interesting and will say "good for you" or "better you than me" but for the most part, don't really care. And honestly, why should they? This is MY dream, my goal, my legs.... So this leaves me wondering, when you don't have the verbal affirmations and support from people on your journey, is actually reaching the destination pointless because no one will care when you arrive except for you??? Or is this where self esteem plays it's role and you give yourself all of the support and congratulations you could ever want or need?

Most of the running blogs that I read are written by people who are either true athletes or are trying to lose weight. They chart progress, pounds, miles, days, diets, etc... The more athletic people write about their greater fitness goals, doing triathalons every day, mountain biking, trail hiking, surfing, running 40 miles a day, blah blah blah. I have nothing in common with any of those people. I don't diet, I don't need to lose a lot of weight (a few vanity pounds would be nice) and I'm never going to be an extreme athlete. I haven't joined any running support groups, I don't really chart my progress by any measurable standards and aside from a brief mention here and there, no one really knows how my running is going on a day-to-day basis. I don't have a niche or really fit in anywhere (long suffering problem of mine anyway) and so I feel "out in the cold" so to speak, in the running world. I am solely responsible for picking my own ass up and carrying it another ten feet when I feel like I can't go another step. It's me that makes me run. I have no audience, no followers, no crowd, no applause from anyone. So I guess running really is what I set out for it to be huh? For me. And while I definitely feel the solitude and a little bit of loneliness from time to time, it's kind of nice to know that it really is just about me. From what I can gather about self esteem, it doesn't really count if you're comparing yourself to people anyway. You can always look at someone and feel inferior; that's low self esteem. And you can look at someone else and feel like you're better; that's vanity. Loving yourself means not only loving who you see in the mirror, but mirroring that love back to those you might otherwise compare yourself with.

This truly is the journey of a lifetime.