2024 will always be the year I started running. My first run was on January 14th, and since then, I’ve stuck to it. One run every other day, all year long. I never would have guessed it, but running turned out to be one of the highlights of my year, profoundly improving my life in ways I didn’t expect.

I ran 889,5 kilometers, which took me 106 hours and 49 minutes. My average pace was 7'12"/km. My current average pace for December 2024 is 6'23".

Since I started running in January, I’ve noticed something that, while not incredibly surprising, is still new to me: while I’m running, I feel stronger, more physically capable, and healthier. It’s a reliable way to experience eustress on a scalable level.

What’s more, when my body feels like it’s functioning as it should, the quality of my thinking improves as well.

Physical strength leads to clearer, more optimistic thoughts, and less ego-driven thinking. When I’m not using energy to build up defenses, it’s easier to be more kind, humble, friendly, empathetic, and loving.

In short, feeling physically strong makes it easier to think strong thoughts. Running is a simple, scalable and reproducable way to achieve that.

Earlier this year I decided that I’m not walking enough. It’s supposed to be healthy and my average daily step count for 2021 looked like this:

That’s obviously not good enough. An average of 4000 steps is not only embarrassing but also a far cry from the 10,000 steps you’re supposed to walk if you trust some company’s advertisements. Or science.

I tried walking 10,000 steps a day previously and found that it’s basically impossible to do if you don’t have a commute or two hours a day to walk through the city. Since I’ve been working from home for six years now and I didn’t plan on walking through Berlin Mitte two hours each day, I needed a better solution.

My friend Luise told me about her WalkingPad. A slow treadmill you can put under your standing desk to walk while working. A worthwhile investment, as you can see by my stats for 2022.

If you want to walk more in 2023, make sure to check out Stoins. It’s a step counter I designed and programmed that lets you repair your walking streak by collecting Stoins. It’s a whole thing.