The Art of Listening

I know this is a vague and generic title for this blog post, but stick with me as it will make sense I hope.

First, enjoy this lovely picture of this living wall of beautiful flowers that we saw in downtown South Haven, Michigan when we were up there last month.

The first thing that I want to say is that my marathon training has come to a point that I am having to take a forced break. I feel like as I am getting older that I am learning and doing a better job of listening to my body. I have noticed lately that towards the end of my runs and after my runs my lower left leg; around my calf to my ankle has been sore and aches enough to notice and be bothersome. I had this before and took some days off and it helped, but it returned this week. Even though I have tried to slow down and not run as hard because I don't really need to, it still returned. At this point, I feel like it could be a form of shin splints or achilles tendonitis. I am not having any swelling, bruising, or anything like that and it does mostly go away when I am not exercising, but there is some minor discomfort especially in the mornings. I am trying to do some stretching, but think I am going to take a week off, maybe up to two weeks.

This is disappointing because as a runner, especially training for a marathon, it is hard to not want to keep pushing through it and run. However, I do know that if I do keep doing this and not listening to my body that I might not be able to run the marathon and even cause serious issues. I was going to try to go for an 18-mile run yesterday and obviously that has been postponed. The good thing though is that the marathon isn't until the beginning of November, so I still have time. I also realize that training is more about increasing my endurance to make sure I can finish the race, but as far as my general fitness level or increasing speed, there probably isn't much I can do at this point. My goal is 3 hours 20 minutes and this is still going to be my goal, but I probably won't know how realistic that is until at least after the marathon starts in within the first 10K (6.2 miles) or so.

Switching gears to another thing that requires listening is about my writing and novels. I recently sent a colleague of mine the first two to read and I am not sure if she mentioned this to other people, but another colleague that I don't get to talk to a lot because I don't see him much asked about my novels and wanted to read them too. I obliged and sent them his way. He asked me why I don't try to get a literary agent or at least publish them on Amazon as people have mentioned in the past. I always think or have thought that this requires a lot of work and even money and I just continue to write for the sake of writing; however, he stated that haven't I done the main work or most of the work already? This, of course, being that I wrote the novels. That statement might seem obvious but at the same time felt like a realization that for somehow I haven't fully considered; the main work is actually writing a novel and I have now written three. (Well, the third one needs to be typed and that will require time and thought as it will be revised and changed at least a bit I am sure).

With this all being said, this is getting me closer and I did Google "how to find a literary agent?" and the truth is that it does look difficult and like it is a lot of work or at least dedicated persistence and endurance and even if you do get one, nothing is promised as far as getting published or selling any of your novels. Honestly, this all holds me back and would take time that I do not have and almost feel like if I could have someone to help me with all of it, but who would do that and someone that wouldn't ask for a big share of the returns? I don't know if that sounds selfish or not, and imagine that it would be no biggie if I somehow became a bestselling author and was making a lot of money, but to get to that point. Maybe self-publishing on Amazon is something I should consider again because deep down I would like to see my novels published but at the same time don't want it to be a major disappointment or makes me lose my joy and interest in wanting to write just for the sake of writing.