Life is a long distance run. And as a half marathon runner, there is much I have learnt from my running. Some principles of sports can easily become guiding principles for life.

Start slow and finish strong. Expending our energy upfront will get us ahead for a while but soon we will deplete vital energy and struggle towards the end. Similarly, easing slowly into our work and projects, gradually building momentum helps us go the distance.

Have milestones but don’t panic. Sometimes we fall short of our milestone. If we panic and rush, breaking our rhythm, we’ve compromised the run. In life too, we must have our goals and milestones, but if we find we are falling a bit behind, we need to just keep the rhythm and discipline and before we know it, we would have made up for lost time.

Some run to keep fit. But you need to be fit to run well. The overall strengthening and flexibility is a must. So too in life, our work is one aspect of our life. And if we strengthen the other aspects – family, friends, personal development and community outreach, we become well rounded, giving us the balanced fitness to make a success of whatever we do. But if other aspects of our life are weak, we will find it very tough to deliver our best.

Run at your own pace. A big mistake is running to someone else’s pace and compromising the overall run. So too in life, if we get into comparison mode, rather than finding our own rhythm, we may run the distance but with much pain, anguish and stress. Learning to be secure within and playing to our strength, without stressing someone else’s success and speed, gets us far.

But most importantly, one has learnt that after all the practice and hard work, don’t stress the timing, learn to enjoy the run. Every step and breath taken with awareness and enthusiasm. Enjoying our journey of life is all important. No point being so stressed about the result that when we do get it, we look back and cannot even remember the special moments that we forgot to experience because our of anxiety.

And when we see someone struggling along the way and sometimes slow down a bit to help them get their rhythm back, we would have learnt a lesson life wants us to learn. It’s not just about how many steps we have covered. It’s about how many hearts we have won.