I used to be a very active girl, honestly, I was.

But somewhere between moving away from my taekwondo classes, recreational basketball team, Chinese school ballet, and… now, that changed. I went from being the fastest and splitty-est person in my class (there are photos of me doing all kinds of splits) to the 10+++ minute mile runner.

That’s disappointing for me. Not only to be out of shape, but to have become very out of shape after having been very in shape.

Over the past few years, I keep telling myself I’ll get in shape, I’ll take up running and all these good things. But the habit never lasts very long.

This time, I am trying to enforce it. I’ve signed up for my very first 5K ever. I will be participating in the Cosmic Run in DC this October, and I am starting as an absolute novice.

I really liked the premise of this run. It’s not a very hardcore or competitive race – you’re not timed during the run. You don’t even have to run. Some people just dance and rave through the entire thing. (Very tempting option, believe you me.) I have been getting into EDM lately, especially for when I do get off my bum to exercise, so the idea of an entire event set to an EDM soundtrack, complete with fluorescent colors and LED lights, and rounded off with a great big EDM party sounded totally amazing and fun. Who knows, maybe I’ll even wear a fun costume to run in. (Neon tutus have always appealed to me…)

So far, I had been running on a pretty regular basis, until I got back on campus to start packing up my apartment for moving out. I am better about my schedule when I’m at home, since I feel safer running in my neighborhood than I do around my campus in the evenings.

I’ve been trying out the Beginner’s 5K training plan on RunKeeper. It’s been pretty good to me, so far, as far as starting to get used to running more. I hope I can stick to it and be able to run the 5K continuously.

I’ll keep this blog updated with my progress here, so long as I… keep running between now and October!

I’m a little bit scared that I’ll do terribly. Part of the reason that I’m so out of shape is that once I started getting out of shape, I was too embarrassed to take part in the sports and other activities I loved so much. With any luck, that won’t be an issue this time around.

Do you have any tips for someone running her first ever 5K after several years of not… moving… much…? Have you participated in Cosmic Run before?