Earlier this week I woke up one morning with a feeling that I can best describe as completely flat.
I used my usual techniques for dealing with this type of situation - going for a more substantial run than usual, and taking myself to a busy coffee shop and scribbling down any and all thoughts that I had.
Unusually, my techniques did not have the desired effect and I continued in a state of "flatness" for the best part of three days. It was only when I emerged from my metaphorical tunnel that I had the detachment to look back on what actually happened.
As I was writing this, the lyrics of the song "Pick Yourself Up", which continues "dust yourself off, start all over again" came into my head.
What I realised is that when my first attempt to pick myself up didn't work, I tried to start all over again before I'd managed to pick myself up, let alone dusted myself off.
Now I don't know about you, but if I try to move forward while I'm still lying on the ground, the best I can manage is a rather feeble crawl, which tends to increase my feelings of self-consciousness. Crawling adults tend to stick out and attract attention.
Let me just ask you a question - when a friend of yours has a nasty fall, do you a) help them to get up again before helping them to move forward; or b) tell them to not be so pathetic, and to just get up and keep going?
I thought so. Why is it then that I, and I strongly suspect you too, talk to myself in the way I described in the second option above?
With a friend, somehow we easily tap into our compassionate, caring side. Most people I know are not so good at doing the same with themselves.
So my tip for this month is when you're not firing on all cylinders, you're in the tunnel, or you've just tripped up and are still lying on the ground in your job or your life, forget trying to move forward until you've shown yourself some real compassion and worked out what you need
to just pick yourself up.
We'll deal with the brushing off and starting again once we're standing up straight and tall.
I know that's what I'm going to do next time I'm flat on the floor.
See you soon.
If you'd like to establish a new habit, such as running a mile each day or saving money on a regular basis, here's an excellent article with loads of suggestions on 
Since the middle of February I have been writing a blog of my experiences, thoughts and musings whilst undertaking my experiment of seeing how many days I can keep up this challenge of running at least a mile each and every day.