The first time you bent down to tie your shoes before heading out for a run. That first off-beat breath, the first uncertain step. The first time you pinned a race bib to your shirt. The first time you thought: What am I even doing?<\/i><\/i><\/p>\n
There\u2019s something about first times that\u2014when we look back\u2014feels meaningful, full of sensation. I remember my first time perfectly. And no, it wasn\u2019t great.<\/p>\n
I felt awkward and clumsy. Every step was a struggle, every breath felt wrong.<\/p>\n
Since then, a lot has changed. I\u2019ve run farther, run better, chosen the mountains over other types of runs, and made running a cornerstone of my life.<\/p>\n
Starting something new makes us uncomfortable because we feel clumsy, inadequate, frustrated. No one likes being a beginner, but at the start, it\u2019s unavoidable\u2014we feel out of place and often unsure of what to do. We live in a world that expects us to be good right away, competent right away, high-performing right away, as if the only way to earn our place is by producing results.<\/p>\n
How many times have you judged an athlete, a coworker\u2014or yourself\u2014based on a single performance? We\u2019re surrounded by a culture of constant performance, where messing up once is seen as failure.<\/p>\n
But what if it were the opposite? What if we could feel at ease\u2014or even enjoy\u2014the chaos, the awkwardness, the discomfort that comes with first times? What if we saw them for what they truly are: a sign that we\u2019re learning something new? Maybe then, it would be easier to find the courage to change, to put ourselves out there, or to start over. Because it\u2019s in those very beginnings that we can still experience true freedom. That\u2019s where we can mess up without losing anything, where we can learn, grow, and start to figure out who we really want to become.<\/p>\n
In a world that demands perfection, having the courage to be clumsy is a revolutionary act. To feel comfortable in the discomfort\u2014and turn that initial awkwardness into momentum\u2014we need to revisit our first times. Not out of nostalgia, but to see them with fresh eyes and recognize how far we\u2019ve come, how those uncertainties were really the first signs of transformation.<\/p>\n
Reframing our first times means seeing them for what they truly are: the starting line of the journey that shaped who we are.<\/p>\n
Revisiting your \u201cfirst time\u201d holds immense value. Psychologically, all first times have a particular power\u2014they\u2019re emotionally charged experiences, and that\u2019s why they stick in our memory more vividly than most others.<\/p>\n
Our minds register these early experiences as deeply meaningful: moments when we pushed ourselves, when something shifted, when we crossed a threshold.<\/p>\n
Remembering them reconnects us with the authenticity of our motivation. Before goals, before numbers, before performance\u2014there was simply the need to do something for ourselves: to move, to react, to breathe better, to carve out space. It helps us reconnect with our deeper purpose\u2014what psychology calls intrinsic value<\/i>: the reason we do something, regardless of outcomes.<\/p>\n
Motivation comes and goes. It fluctuates with mood, energy levels, and circumstances. Sometimes we lose that spark, because motivation\u2014though powerful\u2014is unstable. It\u2019s driven by emotion. But purpose<\/i> is what remains even when everything else wavers. It runs deeper, it\u2019s more rooted, and it doesn\u2019t depend on a stopwatch or a score. Purpose is what sustains us in the long run\u2014it\u2019s our compass, the steady point we orient ourselves toward, even when we feel lost. It helps us push through hard times, to see that the struggle has meaning, and that there\u2019s a deeper reason behind every effort, every training session, every new beginning.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s why returning to our first time is so important\u2014it\u2019s where our purpose took shape. Maybe we didn\u2019t even realize it then, but in that awkward, uncertain first step was already all the power of our \u201cwhy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every time we start something, we do it for a deep reason. Remembering that reason is the only way to keep going, especially when the spark seems to fade. It reconnects us with the most honest part of our journey.<\/p>\n
And you? Do you remember your first time? Hold onto it\u2014it will be your fuel in moments when you feel like stopping. It will help you face each new beginning with a little less fear and let you run farther than you ever thought possible.<\/p>\n
Laura Burzi<\/b><\/p>\n
(I talked about first times because this is my first time on RunLovers. Like with every first step, I feel a little awkward\u2014but I\u2019m savoring the excitement of a new beginning, the feeling of a lap about to unfold. I\u2019m imprinting in my mind the reasons why I write, and this is where I begin.)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Remembering where you started will help you run farther.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":93005,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[15207],"tags":[22423,22173,22422],"powerkit_post_featured":[],"class_list":["post-93006","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lovers-en","tag-inesperienza-en","tag-motivazione-en","tag-prima-volta-en"],"yoast_head":"\n