What keeps us going? Or perhaps a better question: What gets us started? I recently learned a wonderful term: the Zeigarnik Effect, named for a Russian psychologist, Bluma Zeigarnik (photo above). I saw this referenced in a writing blog, specifically in relation to getting off your procrastination butt to write more. Conviently, Daphane, the writier of that blog, posted a link for more information about this effect in an article the PsyBlog. To quote from that blog post:
What all these examples have in common is that when people manage to start something they’re more inclined to finish it. Procrastination bites worst when we’re faced with a large task that we’re trying to avoid starting. It might be because we don’t know how to start or even where to start.
What the Zeigarnik effect teaches is that one weapon for beating procrastination is starting somewhere…anywhere.
Don’t start with the hardest bit, try something easy first. If you can just get under way with any part of a project, then the rest will tend to follow. Once you’ve made a start, however trivial, there’s something drawing you on to the end.
As you can image the Zeigarnik Effect could easily apply to running or exercise in general. Just like any other task we do or don’t do in life: We have to get off the couch to implement it, but once we get started we want to finish it or we will feel anxious about it until we have finished it.
I believe that one needs to set a goal, with enough lead time that we can realistically make it happen. Let’s say you want to run a 10K race in 10 weeks; there are excellent programs that will help you realize that goal, but it has to be implemented daily or at least on a schedule (much like 30 day challenges… more on that in another blog post). The same holds if you want to run a marathon or want to run that marathon in a faster time than the last one you ran or if you want to lose weight or just want to get into better shape. The Zeigarnik Effect shows that once you start a program, with a realistic goal, you will want to finish it.
One of the secrets to getting started and to keep you going, is to do a bit at a time. For example, I did not lose weight overnight… it took several months. I did not run faster in a week… that also took several months and lots of discipline; all accomplished one step at a time and with the help of supportive friends with similar objectives. But I’ll also note that I did not have a goal of losing weight; nor necessarily of running faster, I just wanted to run better – for fitness and for my health. That was a simple achievable goal, but look what it lead to! So talk about low expectations leading to better things! Perhaps that tactic will work for you too.
So find and set your goal and get your gear on and get it started. One way to do this and to keep it going is to tell friends or family members your plan, your dream or your goal; that way you put yourself out there and it sets up a commitment. Perhaps find friends with the same goal or join a running clinic and work on it together. Use the Zeigarnik Effect to keep you going… it is apparently within all of us as long as we allow it to manifest itself.
I am a runner.
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