Running is just a means of getting from here to here (says the person who doesn’t jog).  What is important is the reason why you’re running.  Yes, you need to get from here to there.  So did the chicken, we just don’t know why. 🙂  There is a grave difference between running towards something and running away.  Not to be overly dramatic but running towards something is a meme we make fun of all the time…you know, two lovers running through a field of wildflowers and somehow not tripping on anything or having an allergy attack.  Running away from something is the hiker being followed by a bear or the mouse running from the cat running from the dog.  All of it is running, but the end results are amazingly different.

In life we need to recognize when we’re running towards and when we are running away and why.  Things aren’t black and white. Running away isn’t always bad and running towards isn’t always good.  Running towards and abusive spouse out of fear that things Angel Wingswould be worse is not the best idea, but could save the life of your child. Running away from the best job/house/relationship you’ve ever come across is more than likely self sabotage.  Many of my clients really want to be able to run away from a situation.  Not because it warrants it, but because it means they aren’t responsible for a life altering, appropriate, healthy, but difficult decision. I mean, who wants to be the bad guy, right?  So they look for a means to have to run away, to have to do the hard thing. If they have to because they have no other choice, then it’s not really a choice and they are bowing to fate, right?

We think of running towards as the most obvious and easy thing.  To run towards your best life, your greatest joy, the forever love of a soul mate, who wouldn’t do that? But that presumes that you are certain of the outcome, that you aren’t leaving behind a piece of yourself, that the future isn’t a blank page needing to be filled with the unknown and that your hands aren’t so tightly gripped around the old that you can’t unclench them.  That your feet have been in the same place for so long that they’ve forgotten how to move.  Running towards can seem like leaving paradise for an uncertain future. It is a revolutionary act.  So are you ready to put on your running shoes?