Milestones that motivate me
When I'm really out of shape, I can't run any distance at all--just half a mile, maybe just a quarter mile.  That distance improves pretty quickly once I start running three or four times a week, but I remember, from the first time I started running as an adult, finding that slow progress really discouraging.  If it took me two weeks to go from being able to run a quarter mile to being able to run a half mile, how long would it take before I could run, say, 5 miles?

I learned, though, that there are certain milestones along the way.

First, for me, is when I can run for 9 minutes without having to stop and walk.  Once I can do that, all of a sudden I can run for 20 minutes.  Being able to run for 9 minutes means that my aerobic capacity is good enough to support my running pace--if it's even a tiny bit short, I have to stop and walk before 9 minutes are up.  Once I can run for 9 minutes, I can run until my legs get tired.  When I'm out of shape, that turns out to be about 20 minutes.

That's a crucial milestone.  Until I can run for 20 minutes, the workouts aren't really satisfying, even if they're hard.

I hit that milestone last week sometime.  This week I hit two more that I can remember from the last couple times I started running after a long break.

In order to run for my full 20 minutes, I basically have to run as slow as I can.  So, my next milestone is when I can, for part of the run, run a little faster.  That is, the point when "as slow as I can run" and "as fast as I can run" are no longer the exact same speed.

I structure my workouts around a weekly schedule that includes one long run and a few shorter runs.  When I'm first starting, though, my short run is as far as I can go, so it's also my long run.  Today, though, I hit another little milestone--I ran a second lap around Kaufman Lake.  So, now I've got a long run, as well as a short run.  They're both pretty short, but at least they're not the same.