The Courage.

Like most things, it turns out that running is a mental process as much as a physical one, so to get my head in the right place, I reached out to my sister who has run marathons. She told me about a book called, “The Courage to Start” by John “The Penguin” Bingham.

This is not a technical manual for running, but rather it is a sort of runner’s memoir about how and why this overweight man in his forties decided to start running. His writing is funny, quick & easy, and self-deprecating, so it is an enjoyable read. More than that though, he makes you feel okay about starting out, but he does it in a pretty unsentimental way, which is nice. It very easily could have become a Chicken-Soup-for-the-Soul type of thing (gag me with a spoon), but didn’t.

I’m not proselytizing or anything, but it is a useful resource that’s out there if you too would like to subject yourself to new sorts of painful physical abuse:

The Courage to Start.



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