@ian74 123203 wrote:
The first one was really just a mindset change.
Ding ding! ian74, I think that’s the key.
Just chiming in to say this is a very common struggle. I recently moved to Arlington from remote places and, though I’m not really new to cycling, I’m still trying to find the right balance with commuting. I find opportunities and excuses to bike about 5 times more often than I did about a month ago, and every ride has been its own little adventure. But I know myself all too well; the day it starts to feel like drudgery, or I’m overly tired, or I’m only doing it to beat some metric, I will slack off. My goal is to find some joy in every trip, and do as many of them as possible without injury or fatigue. I just have to believe that cumulatively it will pay off and I’ll get stronger.
Are there any coffee clubs along your route? Meeting people who do this every day is inspiring, but they’ll be the first ones to tell you they had to work up to a daily routine. After socializing, caffeine, and breakfast sometimes I’ll hang with the pack going into work and other times not, and nobody’s keeping score. And you might just learn that they’re not all commuting every day.
Comparisons are sometimes counterproductive. There will always be those who ride faster/slower, longer/shorter, more or less often than you. You just gotta write your own story, it’s the only one that’s meaningful.
