I've been continuing to go for a run three times per week since the 5k. At this point, it's starting to feel like just a habit I've picked up. I like it.

I like it because it's something I can do myself with minimal requirements. And for the time when I'm running, I'm completely alone. I'm the kind of person who is most comfortable alone. It's not that I dislike people, in fact, some of my best friends are people. I just find that when no one is around, I stop observing myself. I stop making sure my gait is normal, I stop thinking about what my hands are doing, or what face I'm making, and just exist. It's really relaxing.

But I wasn't talking about being alone, I was talking about running.

I like to listen to audiobooks when I run. So far since I've started training, I've worked my way through Hiking With Neitzsche by John Kaag, Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder, and Falling Back in Love with Being Human by Kai Cheng Thom. I'm currently listening my way through What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami. All provided free of charge by the local library, which I am ever grateful to since I've been broke.

Hiking with Neitzsche and Sophie's world were both visits to things I read in the past. In the case of Sophie's World, it was one of the assigned texts in my very first Philosophy Class. The others have been new to me, even if the authors are not. I don't feel I absorb as much in an audiobook as I do reading it, but it does often serve to reinforce something I've already read. I plan to actually sit down and read the new ones when I find the time.

I think I'll continue exposing myself to new ideas and revisiting old ideas, all while challenging myself physically and competing only with myself. Who knows, maybe I'll try to do another 5k sometime, or even something bigger than that.