Passion v.s. Addiction

This week was not a great week for my training. I only did 3 of my planned workouts and I really struggled with getting out the door. I've started classes again so I'm in class 31 hours a week, and this combined with still having to take care of patients and finishing homework has made my life very busy. These aren't excuses but new obstacles that I need to learn to deal with. I love going out and training and one of the best things to do after a long day of classes is to go out for a run and just not think. The problem I run into is that at the end of the day I don't feel like doing anything. I want to relax, kick up my feet and stare at the wall. The idea of going out into the Ga heat and putting my body through a workout seems to be the last thing I want to do. The workouts I did do were forced and painful, partly due to the heat and partly due to the fact I couldn't turn my brain off. This only made me want to skip later workouts that much more. The worst was a short mid week run at the end of a 10 hour day at school. It was suppose to be a fairly easy 45 minute run with a couple 45 second bursts. It wasn't a hilly course and should have been an easy run, but man did I suffer.


It started out at an easy pace and ended at a walking pace. I was about 20 minutes into it when I really started to suffer. I started to get stomach cramps, there was no breeze, and the heat index was close to 117 degrees. I was absolutely drenched in sweat and felt like crawling back home. I made it home after refusing to walk until I was at the front of my neighborhood and I felt like collapsing. This was not what I enjoyed about running, this is not why I train, this is not the sport I love.
This is an issue I have really struggled with. It's a simple concept; if you love to do something it should be easy to do. I love triathlons. I love the complexity of the sport, the attention to detail, the need to not only win a race but to outrace yourself, the desire to become something greater and faster than you ever were before. This really is a passion in my life and yet I still have trouble getting out the door. Why is that? For me when I dwell on this idea, this concept that it should be easy if you love it the only conclusion that I can come to is that there is a difference between an addiction and a passion. I struggle with getting out the door not because I don't love this sport but because I'm not addicted to it. I don't have a need to go out and get my training in. Sure that would make it easier to do my training, but I would dare to say that I would rather have a passion for something than an addiction to something. I might struggle with the day to day of completing my training but when I finish a workout, when I look at my week totals I can say I did that because I wanted to do it, not because I needed to do it. We enjoy things we want to do exponentially more than things we need to do. So while I'm jealous of an athlete who is addicted to his sport for their ability to do their training day in and day out, I would much rather struggle with the day in and day out so that each day can be a victory for me. It's this struggle that lets us feel like true champions of our sport and allows us to inspire people to a whole different level.