EMOTIONAL REFUELING

Doing the things you love and what matters to you is a great way to refuel when your mental energy is low.

When you do the things you love, and the things that truly matter, it’s like plugging yourself back into a power source. Injuries, burnout, and life has a way of slowly draining our energy, often leaving us feeling tired, flat, or disconnected from ourselves. This can feel overwhelming when we still need to fulfill responsibilities and stay hopeful. We need to know how to emotionally refuel.

When you spend time doing your sport, creating art, connecting with friends, helping others, or simply being present in a way that aligns with your values, something shifts. It's easier to be you, funner, happier. Your mind feels clearer. That’s because meaningful activities don't suck energy; they give it back. These activities are fuel sources.

Once when I was struggling, a friend asked me, "What is something that you love that you haven't done in awhile?" I thought, and remembered that I love to write poetry, but that I hadn't in a long time. She suggested I work on something, and then send her the result. In that way, she also acted like my accountability partner, supporting me to get it done.

These moments act like a reset button. They remind you of your strengths, your passions, what makes you feel alive, and that you are not an athlete, but a whole human who does a sport, and so much more. Even a small dose of an alternate activity can restore motivation, confidence, and a sense of purpose. You may not change your circumstances, but you change how you feel inside them. When you make space for what you love, you don’t just recharge—you return to yourself.

Gather, stay safe

Gather, stay safe, run easy and slow. Follow the river though she’s secret and low.

Green hits the eyes with a riot of sound, some trees standing up, and some laying down.

We learn first by going where we do not know. Gather, stay safe, run easy and slow.

Here work your plow, and here sink your hoe. Sweet air, cicada, run easy and slow.

Took us so long to get here but we’re closer to home, gather, stay safe, run easy and slow.

Birds bless the dawn with cantations so sweet, gather, run strong, wear the dust on your feet.

Meg Waldron Camp River Runners, WVa, August 2020

Meg Waldron has her Masters in Sport Psychology and works with athletes to help them recover joy in success in sport. A long-time sport coach, Meg was a high school All-American track athlete and competed full scholarship in college. She brings 14 years of school teaching to her work.