Last weekend, the teacher I had for both 3rd and 4th grades (my favorite teacher) had a retirement party. There, I saw one of my good friends from high school with whom I'd sort of lost touch. I'd known her since I was about 7 years old, and we'd been good friends for a long time.
We're Facebook friends, but it was really great to see her in person for the first time probably since high school.
Immediately she came clean with me.
"I've been sort of Facebook stalking your running and weight loss and I wanted to tell you that you inspired me and I signed up for a 5K!" she said excitedly.
I was totally thrown. In a good way.
I've had a lot of people -- ones that I'm in constant contact with and ones that I haven't spoken to in 10 years -- get in touch with me to talk about my weight loss and my running and ask for advice. That in itself has been awesome. There are some people I've barely ever talked to that have asked me about how I started running and what I did to get where I am.
However, this was the first time that someone I have known for a long time told me that I directly influenced her to sign up for a race, something she has never done before. Just because she knew she could. Because she knew I did.
I've said it before, but when I started losing weight and running, I wasn't really doing it for anyone else but me. But it's turned into something a lot bigger than me. I've had friends give me blog post ideas (because what they suggest would help them out), ask me how I started running, what apps or programs I used to start running and how I changed my eating.
I hope to accommodate all those requests soon. My day job is calling at the moment, but when I have more free time, I will get to those blog requests.
But I would like to say thank you to all the supporters I've had and all the people that have asked me for advice and tips. It means a lot to me to have so many people ask me how I did what I did, because, well, it means I really did something, if that makes any sense.
Thanks again and stay tuned for your requests!
What a good feeling. I've just had someone on facebook tell me that they were inspired by my weight loss and signed up for a summer 5K in Toronto. It blows my mind because when I started this just over 3 months ago, I wasn't even sure if I'd have the strength to make this happen. Now, at 50 lbs down, my work is actually helping other people get out there and do the same - amazing.
ReplyDeleteGreat work on all you've done - its quite incredible.