The day I became a marathon runner, my life changed.
I ran my first marathon in summer 2007. At the time, I needed to run it in under 3:40 to qualify for the legendary Boston Marathon. My time was 3:39:59.
I qualified.
My life changed.
I did Boston. I brought my time down to 3:26. That’s when my quest for the fastest time began and I started feeling really hungry. Hungry for pushing back my limits and hungry for eating date puree. Hahaha! My times kept dropping, I was experiencing extraordinary feelings and I just kept wanting more and more.
2007: Quebec City Marathon.
2008: Boston Marathon.
2009: New York City Marathon.
2010: I was pregnant. I had a miscarriage and then became pregnant again.
2011: I became a mother for the first time.
2012: I ran a marathon in 3:08 and my life drastically changed.
One month later, I launched madamelabriski.com and went into business, opening my advertising agency 21 Grammes agence d’idéation. Madame Labriski was still in its infancy. I continued to build up both my ad agency and Madame Labriski while also being a mom. I worked really, really hard.
The Madame Labriski adventure started to gather speed with the release of my famous yellow cookbook in French Ces galettes dont tout le monde parle. It was crazy. Copies were flying off the shelves and I was receiving an ever-increasing number of requests to give conferences. My life was going at full tilt, my mind was brimming with ideas, I was working hard and life was good.
At the Montreal International Book Fair, I met a prominent and seasoned Quebec entrepreneur, who’d also just released a book, and we chatted together about sports, life and entrepreneurship. He had no idea who the women who seemed to be selling tons of copies of her cookie cookbook was. It was obvious he didn’t really care. I talked to him about my business objectives, dreams and vision, and about running. He told me, as I’d already been told several times, that it would be impossible for me to raise the bar high in business while continuing to be a high-performance runner according to my personal goals.
I agree that sometimes we may need to revisit our objectives. But do we have to believe everything everyone tells us? When people are constantly saying that you can’t do it, you end up believing them.
When I started out as a marathon runner, I ran lots of races throughout the year but only one marathon, which I trained very hard for in order to perform. When I became a mother and then started my own business, I skipped a few years. I continued to run, because for me it’s a way of life, but I no longer registered for a marathon because my whole life was basically a marathon in itself.
But in January 2018 I turned 40 and I told my hubby that regardless of everything that was going on in my life, I wanted to run a marathon. Because I love the training leading up to that great running celebration and because I missed it. I therefore signed up for the Toronto Marathon, which was to take place in October.
