Why do you?

Yesterday was the hottest day of the year so far in my city, and it was absolutely beautiful out. I had this great plan to go for a run when I got home from work, but as I walked to my car at the end of the day, I realized it may just be too hot to run outside. I went back and forth with myself on whether I should wait until it cooled down, or just do a treadmill run. Now, don't get me wrong, I love my treadmill. But given the choice between the treadmill and an outdoor run (weather permitting), I will always choose the outdoors. There is something so much more therapeutic about running outside, and obviously it feels much more natural. As my good friend Allie once said, "In the olden days people got their exercise through their everyday activities outside. Now we sit inside on a chair or couch for 90% of the day, lift a metal stick up down a couple times and call it working out, and wonder why we have health problems" :) So again, my point is...I would rather go outside.

When I got home, I realized it was way too windy. Now you may be wondering, "didn't you just say it was a beautiful day?" Let me explain something. My house is located in what my sister and I like to call "The Wind Vortex". No matter how nice a day it is in our city, when you get to our subdivision, it seems to always be windy. I'm sure you know from personal experience that sharp winds can sometimes make for a very painful run.

So anyway, I decided to wait it out and see if the wind died down. Not only did the wind not die down, but the sky grew darker and darker and it seemed like it was definitely going to rain. I finally realized I had better go now or my two options would be a treadmill run, or laziness setting in and no run at all (the latter would have probably been more likely). So I got ready to head out when my brother looks at me and goes, "It's about to storm - why are you going for a run?"

Obviously I felt like it was a hypothetical question and went anyway. But for some reason, throughout my entire run, all of the reasons why I run despite less than ideal circumstances kept running through my mind. Cheesy pun intended :)

My run turned out to be perfectly fine - 3 miles later the sun had come back out and the wind was actually a welcome break from the heat.

But I'm sure most of you understand - there are so many different reasons to just suck it up and do it that you could never pinpoint just one. And depending on the day and situation, the reasons vary from psychological(trying to run away from a crappy day), environmental (those days where it just feels wrong not to get outside), physiological (when you just need to move)...like I said, the list goes on.

So what I want to know - whether running circumstances are perfect or dismal...why do you run?