"Your doing great"...

Before embarking on my attempts to start running again I made sure I did some basic reading and also on the MFP forums. And as I have mentioned in one of my earlier postings one topic really helped me bite the bullet and start my wogging adventure, which lead to my discovery of C25K. One of the predominant comments that came through other than the you can do it and at least your doing something comments was that often other runners won't acknowledge you as they are in the 'zone', but also there is a great amount that will acknowledge you with a comment of gesture.

Now two things happened today, one was as I was wogging and the other occurred to me as I was recovering while walking home after completing the program. 

 I was nearing the completion of lap 3 and was wondering if I had started out to fast and should walk as my legs where screaming at me, another runner approached and said "Your doing great" giving me the thumbs as she passed continuing her run.
 Before I knew it I had completed this leg and was feeling boosted by the little encouragement I had received from a complete stranger. That one comment helped me get through the rest of today's wog as I replayed it to myself whenever I found myself trying to push through the 'give up your sore' mentality to complete today's C25K!

I was bloody sore afterwards and looking back on today's stats I had started out at a pace of 6:55/6:19 and ended leg 3 with 6:28. So yes I had in fact stared faster than any other wogs where my starting legs were around the 8:30/9:00 mark. But this little bit of encouragement from someone I had encountered while exercising; a complete stranger; helped me push through and not give up. What I had heard about and read actually happened to ME.

 Okay yeah, so It may happen to you alot, and I hope it does and that you do the same. But remember back if you can too the first time you had it happen to you, where a complete stranger, a fellow runner looked at your efforts to run and took a few seconds out of their time to give you motivation and encouragement. I bet you felt like you could smash it and that comment may have helped you that day complete something that you may have been finding hard to keep on with. 
I hope in a few months time when I am able to run some distance with less effort I will  be able to say "your doing great" to someone and never forget how it was at the very beginning. Because that person you encouraged today may decide to keep on going after all and in turn may pass it on to others.
Little things like that can make a difference to us newbies and sometimes perhaps even those more experienced and I myself am going to make the effort when I am wogging to do the same to someone I may see trying hard to run or even walk, and I challenge you out there to do it also! 

As I was recovering unknown to me I realized that I had overcome my issue of not wanting to wog in front of others. Slowly each day as I encountered people the feeling of "Oh shit people are seeing me run" disappeared and today I actually realised I had encountered more people than before and instead of wogging to the path on the left because less people were there I maintained my original track continuing past them. 
And if I had chosen the other less travelled path today I would not of encountered my encouraging runner either. So take the path more travelled because you may miss some helpful words or gestures that will push you to do more each time. 

Did you encounter or offer any encouragement on todays exercise?