The End

365 days ago, I registered for the Inaugural Star Wars Dark Side Challenge, resolved to make it my last race ever, and determined to finally PR my half marathon by running it in under two hours. I started this blog to document my progress and named it "Run to the Dark Side."

I didn't know a year ago exactly how appropriate my blog title was going to be.

Every day for seven months, I'd write about what my training for the day looked like, what I ate, how I slept, what I learned. I couldn't wait for my "Danielsan" moment... you know, "Show me 'wax on, wax off'," and holy shit, I know karate! Er... how to run... you know what I mean.

But there was no Danielsan moment for me.

And last April, what was supposed to be the best race of my life turned out to be the worst.

I should have probably put a nice, clean closure to the end of this blog back then but something kept me going for a little while longer. Because it wasn't all horrible. There was one time where I thought maybe I could be a healthy/normal human being, or this other time when I learned I DO have control over my food problems.

But despite these small breakthroughs, it feels like I'm trying to move a mountain, and progress looks like this:

It's especially tough to move mountains when sometimes I mess up and put the pebble back where I found it.

And there's nothing motivational about any of this. So I stopped making daily updates. Through it all, I can't help but feel that the real lesson to be learned from my story is as follows:

Just because you will it to be won't make it so.

Alright, I do know deep down inside that there can't be success without failure. Even one of my greatest heroes, Walt Disney, knew the pain of failure.

Will I run again? I've still got the Avengers half in November, so I can't hang up the running shoes yet. But my only goal for it at this point is to walk away from the race uninjured.

Will I write again? Perhaps. This isn't my first failed blog. Some of you have come with me from prior failed blogs, and I thank you for that. For those of you that are new, know that I won't send you back to any of the others - we only go forward from here. This blog will live on, collecting some cobwebs in the corner of the web, for at least the next two years that I own the domain... so if there's anything I've linked to that you might have found helpful, you may want to bookmark it directly.

Until the next project presents itself, you can follow me on twitter or snapchat for occasional updates, or email me anytime.

Thanks for running to the dark side with me.

Blogroll the last

A shining new era is tiptoeing nearer.

Bonus points if you know what song those lyrics come from.

Here's what I've been reading lately:

Train Like an Athlete:

• Quitting running is the right thing to do for some people.
• I can spend 30 minutes each day walking, especially now that they released the buddy feature in Pokemon Go.

Eat Like an Athlete: 

• A 30 second test to see how many carbs you should be eating.
• Apologies to my husband, but this is why I win.
• Finally - an answer to the carbs vs. fat debate? (Just kidding).
• Common myths about eating disorders.

Think Like an Athlete: 

• Thinking it's time to let go.
• Recovery = Resilience.
• Time to stop dwelling on past versions of ourselves.
• How to accomplish something with only 1/3 of the year remaining.
• Let me get this straight... being a perfectionist isn't fun?

I'm just trying so hard.

And nothing is working.

I've got a fever

And the only prescription is more pumpkin.

I typically feel a twinge of depression this time of year - the back-to-school blues, ya know? Except I haven't had to go back to school for quite some time now. I think the shorter days and colder weather always got me down, too. But now that I don't have to acknowledge the "unofficial end of summer" anymore since I moved to Florida, I'm not really feeling all that sad.

Can't be sad when it's PUMPKIN TIME!!!

I wrote about my infatuation with pumpkin last year, and it hasn't really dissipated in the last twelve months. I've been feeling the pumpkin twitch since the week before my birthday. Every day since August 23rd that I stopped into Starbucks, I'd ask if they had #PSL just in case... always denied. (The Hilton SBux next to my old apartment building made them for me super early last year. I miss that place).

Seriously, what's this guy's beef?? It's NEVER too early for pumpkin. 

I can rank order every pumpkin coffee within a twelve mile radius of my home, but I'm not going to do that here because then I would have to divulge exactly how much pumpkin I've had in the last ten days, and that could be slightly embarrassing. But I've got my list, based on pumpkiny-ness, availability of dairy alternatives, cost, and whether I can tell if I'm drinking coffee or not. 

Sorry, clean eating. Maybe I'll see you again in January. 

Oh, I still otherwise eat really reasonably these days. I'm wondering why this guy isn't a billionaire and why he gives away the secret to not binge eating. Or maybe he already is a billionaire and that's why he gives it away? I'm thinking I might just send him a personal handwritten thank-you note.

My running blog has been sparse on content about running as of late. I still do that occasionally. And see cool things:

I also saw not just one, but TWO friendly cats down near the marina on my running route. One ran off a little too quickly after saying hello, but this one decided to be my pacer for a while: