Your Running/Writing Cheat Guide to Success
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I’ve never been one for convention, can you believe, but I know that many, many people are looking ahead to their New Year’s resolutions, and I think both running and/or writing will feature. The problem with resolutions is always sticking to them for longer than a couple of months.
Over the past three years I’ve found myself in the most deeply consistent and prolific period in both my writing and running. I believe that a large part of that is because I doubled down on identifying the best process for me.
Something I found was that I could draw so many parallels between the processes for running and writing. It was evident in both the approach and the results.
If you’re stuck as to how to start or if you want help thinking about making good habits, I’ve got a handy list of six thoughts you can follow to put you in the best place possible for 2026.
Just the same as the Germans often have portmanteaus that apply to very specific situations1, the Japanese have beautiful, specifically-named concepts that describe how human nature connects to the world, and they form the basis for this list. I hope you can take something away from it.
Your Running/Writing Cheat Guide to Success
1. Start small
Focus on doing one small task. Maybe it’s pulling those shoes on and running down to the end of your street, or maybe that’s writing down the concept that’s been stewing in your head. Maybe it’s a mile, and maybe it’s a page. Either way, just start. Knowing that you did it means that you can do it again (and maybe a little bit more) tomorrow.
Concept: Kaizen - the Japanese philosophy of continuous, incremental improvement. The idea is like the marginal gains of Dave Brailsford where many, many small positive changes lead to significant long-term results.
Running: Do the work to improve your 10k pace by just 1% a month and you’ll be 13% faster in a year. Sounds more impressive, doesn’t it.
Writing: If you write 500 words a day, five days a week, you’ll have written 125,000 words in a year, and that is enough for a book.
