Mental Strength for Runners: Building Confidence, Avoiding Burnout & Overcoming Imposter Syndrome with Shannon Mick

In this episode of the Maximum Mileage Podcast, I sit down with licensed professional counselor, ultrarunner, and mindset coach Shannon Mick to talk about something that doesn’t get enough attention in endurance training: the mental side of running.

We explore how mindset directly impacts performance, consistency, and long-term progress, especially for runners navigating setbacks, self-doubt, or burnout.

Shannon shares her journey from early injuries and uncertainty to becoming an ultramarathon athlete, and how her background in mental health shapes the way she helps runners build resilience, confidence, and a healthier relationship with the sport.

If you’ve ever struggled with feeling “not good enough,” staying consistent, or losing your joy in running, this conversation will give you practical tools to move forward with more clarity and confidence.

In this episode, I cover:

• How to build confidence as a runner, even when you doubt yourself
• Imposter syndrome in endurance athletes, and how to work through it
• Mental strategies to stay focused and grounded on race day
• Burnout in runners: warning signs and how to prevent it
• Why having an identity outside of running improves performance
• Simple, sustainable habits that support long-term growth

This episode is especially helpful for runners coming back from injury, building toward longer distances, or trying to create more consistency without burning out.

Connect with Shannon:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/be.short.run.ultra/
Website: finishstrongermindsetcoaching.com

If you enjoyed this episode, I’d love it if you shared it with a friend or left a review. It helps more runners find the show and build smarter, more sustainable training.

Right, that's us done. If that was useful… share it. Stick it in your club WhatsApp, send it to that mate who's always getting injured three weeks before race day. You know the one ;)

If you want to go deeper on any of this, Nick puts out videos every week on YouTube, and the entire team of coaches are sharing helpful tips on their instagram channels... links below. And if you're thinking you actually need a proper plan and someone in your corner… we've got Guided Coaching from 97 quid a month, right up to full one-to-one coaching with the coach of your choice. Either way, maximummileagecoaching.com is where you want to be.

See you on the next one.

To work with us - https://join.maximummileagecoaching.com/home-page-9835

Nick's YT - youtube.com/channel/UCgdIPeN3bF7I7-tcspyFbVg/

Faye's IG - https://www.instagram.com/fayejohnsoncoaching/

Rachael's IG - https://www.instagram.com/rachforthelongrun/

Hannah's IG - https://www.instagram.com/coach_hannah_witt/

Matt's IG - https://www.instagram.com/ultracoachmatt/

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey, welcome to the Maximum Mileage Podcast. I'm Coach Hannah Witt, and this is where we talk about building strong, resilient runners without the constant cycle of injury, burnout, or guesswork. Each episode, I sit down with runners, coaches, and experts to break down training, recovery, fueling, and mindset so you can train with more confidence and actually see progress at last. And if you prefer to watch these conversations, you can find the full video versions on my YouTube channel, Coach Hannah Witt, under the Performance Collective series. Let's dive in. In today's episode, I'm joined by Shannon Mick, licensed professional counselor, ultra runner, and mindset coach to explore the powerful connection between mental health and endurance performance. We dive into Shannon's journey from struggling to run a mile to becoming an ultra-marathon athlete and how that path shaped the way she coaches runners today. This conversation goes beyond training plans for talking about the mental side of running that so many athletes overlook. Shannon shares practical strategies for building confidence, working through imposter syndrome, and using positive self-talk to stay grounded on race day. We also get into something that doesn't get talked about enough: burnout. How do you know when you're heading there and what can you do to protect your joy in the sport? Whether you're training for your first ultra, coming back from a tough season, or just trying to find more balance in your running and your life, this episode will give you tools to show up with more resilience, more confidence, and a healthier mindset. Let's get started. Welcome back to the show. Today we're very fortunate to have Shannon Mick as a guest. Shannon is a licensed professional counselor and ultramarathon athlete who brings a unique blend of clinical expertise and lived experience to her work. Since 2010, she has supported individuals navigating anxiety, trauma, and life transitions. And in 2020, she launched her private practice to deepen that impact. Alongside her clinical work, Shannon coaches Ultrarunners through her non-clinical business, Finish Stronger Mindset and Mental Wellness Coaching, helping athletes build resilience, navigate setbacks, and strengthen their mental approach to training and racing. Shannon, thank you so much for being on the podcast today. How are you? Good.

SPEAKER_02 2:27

How about you?

SPEAKER_01 2:28

I am excellent. I love your office setup. Like I see a treadmill in the background, like I'm excited.

SPEAKER_02 2:35

Yeah. Yeah. I have half like workspace and then half treadmill. And I used to have a computer where I could take over and actually work on my treadmill, but then it broke.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

So yeah. So you're in the United States. Where are you? Uh what state are you in?

SPEAKER_02 2:54

I'm in Pennsylvania, about 40 minutes north of Pittsburgh, on the very edge of a small town. So if I run one direction, I can, you know, run through town and there'll be lots of traffic. And if I run in another direction, I'll lose cell phone service.

SPEAKER_01 3:14

Wow. So wow. I think I would choose option B, even if it was like no cell phone service. But I guess if you are doing ultra training, like you want to carry your cell phone and have that service in case something happens.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:30

Awesome. So you have such an impressive resume and background, but you're also an accomplished athlete yourself. What exactly got you into ultra-marathon running or just running in general?

SPEAKER_02 3:45

Yeah, what I do is really niche. And I got into running through my husband, actually. We started dating a long time ago. And and oh man, I wanted to spend more time with him because I wasn't a runner at all. You know, I wanted to spend more time with him. And he was marathon training, and you know how that goes. There's like not a whole lot of time to do anything else when you're doing that. So uh I was kind of jealous, and there were boundaries. So I was like, oh, I'm just gonna become a runner too. I'm just gonna join you on your runs. So he was very patient and very kind with me because I couldn't I couldn't even run a mile at that time, and uh barefoot running was really big back then at that point. It was like born to run, came out and everything. And and then I got I was doing that, so I got a stress fracture in my foot. Yeah, ended up in a walking boot for literally three months, something like that, something really stupid. And I kind of just I stuck with it and he supported me, and you know, we ended up doing you know, just a couple of road races, half marathons, and then I I went to the Marine Corps Marathon one year, which is a really great race, but it's very crowded, and that was probably 2015, I think was the year. It was really crowded, just not necessarily my thing. People were pushing and shoving, and there was trash everywhere, like just you know, it was kind of like uh, but then my husband and I found trail running and we started doing that, and it was just it was so different. And of course, there was a big learning curve, like learning how to trail run and the different shoes and gear and stuff that you need for it, and then so he he had to move to Virginia for a few years for his job, and I was up here alone at home, finishing graduate school, and like you know, graduate school's hard. I was in my counseling program, and I came home one day, and it was kind of like a bad day. I turned on TV and there happened to be Badwater 135 documentary on. I think it was the Running on the Sun one, and I just watched it, and by the end of it, I was a little bit tearful, and I thought to myself, what is this? I want to do it so bad, like this is my thing, and I still didn't even know that ultra running was a thing, I just knew that this race existed. So I started doing my research, and I I told my husband about it, and uh, we just like I did my first ultra ultra in 2016, a year after a Marine Corps marathon. So I did the JFK 50 Miler, and that was the craziest experience ever. And I never felt like any of that in my body before, you know, the the the fun, the the pain finishing that race and like near hypothermia because it started like flurrying by the end of the race, um just pushing through and getting getting that finish, and it was just it was incredible. And and then after that, I always hooked on it, and my husband was kind of intrigued by that too, and he wanted to start doing that, so I got him into it in 2017. So then in 2017, we ran a 50 miler together and just had a lot of fun, and we've been doing it ever since.

SPEAKER_00 7:57

Wow, that's a great story. Have you raced bad water?

SPEAKER_02 8:02

No, I've been working on my resume for it and just collecting uh you know really strong 100 mile races. So I have two this year that I'm doing rabid raccoons next month, and then Rim to River 100 is in October.

SPEAKER_01 8:20

So be doing yeah, for people who don't know for bad water, you is it kind of an application process?

SPEAKER_02 8:28

Yeah, there's a an application, it it's it's hard one. Yeah, it takes a long time to complete it and make sure that you're the type of person, like you're gonna follow the rules, you're gonna be safe, you're gonna be able to finish the race. And you you hand in your application along with uh like thousands of people all over the world. And then the you know, the the team at Badwater and the race director Chris Costman, they look at all of the applications very seriously, and they can only pick a hundred people.

SPEAKER_01 9:06

So okay, that's awesome. You know, actually Bob Becker on the podcast a while back. Yeah, you know, of course, he's the Badwater legend. Yeah, again to get Chris. Chris is very, very busy, but you know, everybody keeps talking about Badwater. He's gonna have to be on the show. I've met him before, and yeah, he's he's a nice, nice guy and he's done a lot for the culture community. It would be amazing to have him on the show and put in a good word for you if that happens. But um, yeah, yeah. I love that that's you know, that's what got you excited about bad, I'm sorry, about ultra running in general, but just thinking about that application process a little bit more. I'm gonna have to research it or ask Chat GPT, what is the application process for Badwater? Because I'm thinking, yes, it will ask basic questions like have you completed this, you know, number of races, this mileage, things like that. But does it ask like health questions? Do you have like pre-existing health issues? Does it ask things about your mental well-being? You know, you as a mental health professional, I'm wondering if the application goes into that kind of depth where it asks those kind of questions since your mind is such a huge component in a race of that magnitude.

SPEAKER_02 10:26

Right, yeah, yeah. I'm not sure about that. I do know that it asks, like, about you know, why you want to do the race, character, you know, are like what what kind of how do you support the community sort of questions as well.

SPEAKER_01 10:44

Okay, that's interesting. Well, I really, really hope that you can get into it, and it can be all that you want and more. You seem like a tough person. I I think you can thrive in that, but talking about your, I don't know, third or fourth person that I've spoken with, I feel like in the last week that's mentioned the JFK 50 Mile. And I'm not terribly familiar with that race, but obviously it gets cold because you mentioned hypothermia. But what are the conditions like for that? Where is it exactly, and what's the terrain like? What's it what's it like in general?

SPEAKER_02 11:20

Oh, yeah. The JFK 50 Milo is a really good first ultra marathon. It starts out in Boonsborough, Maryland, which is a small town, um, very cute town. And you do a couple miles, you run up towards the Appalachian Trail. You do about, I think it's like it's been so long since I've done it, but I think it's about 20 miles on the Appalachian Trail. There's lots of, you know, rocks, roots, the usual thing you would see there. I I do remember towards the end of that stretch, there was this poor lady. She fell and broke her arm. Yeah, yeah. So she was getting medical attention when I passed. And then you come down off the trail, and the rest of it is just easy peasy. It's all flat and really boring, but it's exciting because of the spectators and you're running through, you know, the parks there, but it's all on the CNO canal. So, but no.

SPEAKER_01 12:18

Yeah, and I'm thinking if I was doing a 50-mile race, I think I would want to get the more technical 20-mile section out in the beginning while I'm still mentally fresh. Yeah. I mean, it would be mentally drained to be in a really boring flat section beyond that, but it would also less chance of falling, you know, more predictability and hopefully just being able to gut it out. But yeah, I guess some people they kind of need that constant stimulation to keep going. So you really have to get in comfortable with yourself when you encounter kind of the monotony in ultra running. So as a mental health professional yourself, do you have any kind of kinds of tips and tricks to handle when you're out there and it's getting tough? And it's less about, well, it's you're monitoring your body, but your mind starts to slip as well. What how do you coach? Because you have athletes that you work with, how how do you how do you help them through that?

SPEAKER_02 13:19

Yeah, you know, I think the number one thing is confidence building. And between like self-care and their training and making sure their confidence is where it's supposed to be for the race, they're they're gonna have a strong race. So I do a lot of you know, boosting their confidence. And you know, if they have say a bad training run, we're gonna look for the positive, the thing that went well, the thing that they did well, and we're gonna focus on that. We're gonna focus on strengths. You know, that's just as important as fixing the thing that didn't go well. Because when it comes to race day, if there's something that doesn't go well, you need to be able to deal with it and brush it off and stick to the plan as much as possible to just keep going and stay on top of the goal.

SPEAKER_01 14:12

So it's really focusing on positive things. I think about like Miracon runners that I've I've podcasted with, and they've said things like, when you're starting to hurt, think about the things that feel good, like, oh, my elbows don't hurt, you know, that kind of thing. So definitely trying to gear your mind towards thinking about positive aspects instead of negativity. And you know, even when you're not necessarily in in the actual race, when you're training, training is grueling for ultrarunning and trying to always maintain positivity is hard. So you know, when ultra runners come to you and they ask for your help, what are the kinds of things that they struggle with that they when they initially come to you? The confidence, is that it?

SPEAKER_02 15:02

I yeah, I'd say confidence is one of the top things. Yeah, I think that and I've been there too, you know, and and some of it just comes through a lack of experience of you know, trail and ultra running, but there's things that we can do to build that experience along the way in the journey. But see, people are afraid to kind of lean into, I don't want to say like have a big ego about it, but be like, hey, I'm actually pretty good at this, and allow themselves to feel like okay with being happy and feeling good about the kind of runner that they are. So it's you know, I kind of see like you know, people hold themselves back in a way through that. And I, you know, I want to tell them, hey, it's okay. It's like similar to, you know, if you're not working with a running coach, but you kind of want to work with a running coach, and you say to yourself, Well, I'm not good enough or I'm not fast enough to work with a running coach, so I don't deserve one. Similar to that. And I I look at that and I say, No, you know what? You deserve a running coach. Like you deserve to go for that goal at your race. Whether it's you just want to finish your race or you have a time goal or you have a podium goal. You know, if it's like if it's a realistic thing, I'm be like, go for it. You know, I'm gonna be the biggest cheerleader that that person has.

SPEAKER_01 16:38

Yeah, I've never really thought about it in that way when people are contemplating whether or not to start working with a running coach or even with some mental health professional, you know, they they hold themselves back. I I didn't even think that's what the conversation they're having with themselves is I'm not good enough to need, you know, to get a coach. I've always thought that people they seek out a coach when they feel like they're at the end of their rope and they need somebody to guide them because they can't figure it out by themselves. But I mean, that kind of opens up a whole new world for me as a running coach myself, and kind of I'm thinking of what kind of outreach to kind of do, you know, to let people know everybody deserves to have a running coach. Everybody can benefit from some kind of mental health therapy because even if you feel like, well, I don't think I'm crazy or anything, any kind of stigma like that, you know, everybody has things that perhaps they could process better to have a better sense of confidence within themselves, live life in a more joyful way. You know, that's that's very enlightening, and I'm glad that you said that.

SPEAKER_02 17:59

Yeah, yeah. It's and I also like to tell people whether it's counseling or coaching, uh, you know, other other counselors can do whatever works for them, but I like to try to have fun with people and like especially the mindset and mental wellness coaching, we have fun and we'll make jokes or whatever. But yeah, it's just great working with people and you know, whether it's the races that we're really focusing on or something else going on in life that you know they need to talk about, they're they're grieving a lost family member, or they're retiring from running, or you know, anything that that they need. Yeah, we I I try to make it fun too.

SPEAKER_01 18:45

Yeah, when I introduce you, you work a lot with people who are experiencing anxiety, trauma, and like transitions. Does that is that combined with the ultra-running athletes that you work with? Or I mean you work with people who aren't necessarily athletes, right?

SPEAKER_02 19:03

Right, yes. Yeah, a lot of yeah, most of my counseling clients aren't athletes, but they're people who want to be more active and who want to get those mental health benefits from like going out on a walk or like going to the pool or going hiking or something like that. So I I strongly encourage all of that to people and like find a way that you know, moving your body that brings you joy and allow that to help via process, like something you can do for it, whether it's coping or like regulating your emotions or your nervous. So that's like that's a big thing I do push for people to do in counseling if they're not a runner, and that's totally okay that they're not a runner. But yeah, in in mental wellness mindset coaching, that's like that's kind of the main focus, is around the the running and how because I I don't know if you've noticed, but like when I first decided to uh start the coaching business, and you know, I was in the ultrarunning community for a couple of years and uh just talking to people, I I I did notice that a lot of ultrarunners struggle with PTSD and anxiety and other issues, and you know, all of these things that's going on is that like in their in their life, it can leak into running and impact their performance. So that's kind of what made me realize, hey, you know, this is something I can help out in. And so that's kind of that's one of the reasons why I started the coaching business. But yeah, so yeah, sometimes we are going back to that root cause of, you know, like how someone was treated during their childhood or something like that. We're not gonna get like super psychoanalytical or anything because it's just coaching, but we'll talk about it and talk about how that it impacts them day to day, how it impacts their sleep, how it impacts their work, their family time, their social life, and of course their training.

SPEAKER_01 21:17

That sounds really helpful. I was just thinking about people who are simply they want to be more active, but they're dealing with various things that they come to see you. And, you know, like you said, they just maybe going for a walk, going for a hike. But you know, what are the barriers that keep people from you know putting their foot out the door and getting going? Would you say that it's similar to people who choose who are struggling with whether they should start with a coach? Like it's a lack of confidence, or it's maybe a feeling of you know, it's I yeah, why should I even start walking? I'm so far gone. You know, what's a walk gonna do for me? You know, they have the desire but they're They feel like they're so deep in a well. It's like, how can I even climb out by you know going through a five-minute block?

SPEAKER_02 22:08

Oh, yeah, exactly. Exactly. You know, usually like the counseling clients, they yeah, they'll come to me and I wish it wasn't this way, but honestly, I'm I'm similar. You know, you kind of wait till you're at rock bottom to get help from somebody. And uh understandable because you know, we can be very resilient and stubborn and have some support, you know, whether it's from friends and family, whatever, we can have distractions. Phones are a huge distraction these days for people and they just zoom scroll all day. And so I I tend to see people when they're at their lowest, and yes, going out the door, even just for a walk seems like so much to them. And and it's a like, you know, you want to validate that and be like, yeah, okay, but you know, now is you know, we're working together, we're setting goals, now's the time to go ahead and you know, when do you have free time to go out and do a walk for I don't know, maybe like a mile or something. You know, you set some something really obtainable for that person. You know, maybe they only have like 10 minutes to walk on their lunch break at work, but you like that's great. You you do that and you support them and you encourage them to do that. And some people need that accountability, so I will message a reminder, you know, if they want me to, and be like, okay, did you did you get out and do that thing, you know?

SPEAKER_01 23:53

Yeah, that makes sense, and it's so important to set attainable goals because once you get in the habit of reaching those goals, even if they're small, and I'm saying small, doing air quotes for people who listen to this, but you know, it's still a habit of reaching goals, and you start to associate reaching the goals with I feel good about myself, and it's like you want to do more, because everybody well, I would I would I tend to think people think in that way, a similar, similar mindset. But I was thinking about how you mentioned personally you yourself have to get to rock bottom before you reach out for help. And when you were talking about when you started running and it was the born to run era, it was the barefoot running. I'm thinking what, like 2012, 2013, around then, perhaps earlier, sometime around then. I'm in a yeah, similar, similar boat because I I was running before then, but I heard all about the you know, born to run and I'm gonna run barefoot, and I did it, and I got a stress fracture. So, like you're pretty tough if you run to the point where you break the bones in your feet, you know. That says a lot about your mindset and basic resilience because you tend to ignore pain.

SPEAKER_00 25:14

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:18

But um, yeah, I I mean barefoot running, it was a very free experience. Wearing minimalist shoes is all you know, it feels really, really great if you're on soft terrain and you don't overload too quickly. I'm not gonna bash people who are still really into it. But you know, I think about elite athletes who are training in um eastern Africa, like they, and I've seen documentaries, I don't know from personal experience, but when when like people go there and train at their training centers, and they say, Well, I'm gonna run barefoot because you know I think that's gonna help me, they look at them like they're crazy and they're like, Why would you not protect your feet? You know, because the culture over there with running is so vastly different. It's like they take care of their bodies to such an extreme extent, and if anything bothers them, they like shut it down and they take care of it, right? And we are almost like this really pig headed and like continue on until things break. And you know, I think it's such an interesting difference between our cultures, but you know, maybe we should almost take something from their culture because taking care of yourself. You mentioned self-care, that is such a huge component. It's it's not just oh self-care, that's kind of a hyped up phrase right now. Self-care is listening to your body before it breaks and you know, allowing yourself to actually adapt to training and get better.

SPEAKER_02 26:57

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I I think of self-care as a foundation, and we can only build off of that foundation. You know, if it's if it's whacking, someone's gonna be really tired all the time, or or they're not gonna be able to have the energy to to meet specific goals, like maybe it's like that they're meal prepping or they're like getting getting their nutrition ready for their long run, you know, maybe they they miss that because they're tired, because their self-care is lacking. So it's just a lot of things go off of that.

SPEAKER_01 27:35

Do you ever there's two two kind of topics I'd like to talk about a little bit? So, number one being people who perhaps they feel like their running isn't going great. So they almost punish themselves by doing more or cutting their food down, right? Right. And the second thing I'd like to talk about, and I just want to list both of them because I'll forget in five minutes, but the second thing I'd like to talk about is people who they start lacking confidence and they start doubting their training and they they neglect rest days. See those two scenarios frequently.

SPEAKER_02 28:19

They yeah, they come up every once in a while. You know, I try to I I encourage people like, hey, you know, when we first start meeting, let's start meeting weekly until we're we've got the ball rolling, and then you know what we can spread out sessions to how you need them to be. So whether that's every other week or you know, once a month, some people are just as needed now because their event has ended and they're you know taking a break or just slowly ramping training back up for something else. But yeah, uh, you know, having that frequency of sessions at the beginning to help them stay on track really minimizes that sort of issue, whether it's you know, someone who's you know, heading towards burnout like super quickly, whether because they're either like they're punishing themselves or you know, so you know, any of the things that you said really yeah, that's that's kind of one of the ways that I help you know people steer clear of that and just stay on a healthy path.

SPEAKER_01 29:32

So for people who perhaps don't know much about sports psychology, what exactly is burnout?

SPEAKER_02 29:39

Yeah, burnout is whenever you max yourself out. It can be really detrimental both to your physical health and your mental health. Uh, you see people feeling really frustrated, it could lead to depression, anxiety, stress fractures, any anything like that, it could impact your eating. Um, we know that both anxiety and depression impact our satiety, hunger cues. So yeah, I mean, burnouts are really bad thing. It could also lead to a loss of joy in what you do if if you don't have that downtime from running, if you don't have hobbies outside of running, then that's kind of a red flag. You know, there needs to be something else there. We need to look at our identities outside of running. Like who are you outside of running? What do you do? And all you know, that's a big part of it. And all of those things kind of help prevent burnout because we can't always just focus on running all of the time.

SPEAKER_01 30:49

And if somebody is harming themselves in some way, then you know, there might be a deeper issue going on, and that needs to be considered because you work with athletes to a large extent, but you also work with people who are not, you know, designated athletes yet. I'm gonna say yet, but you yourself are also an athlete. Do you ever find yourself getting dangerously close to burnout just because you're in that head space so much?

SPEAKER_02 31:23

I can I can kind of pull myself back. First off, it helps having a running coach because I'm not trying to figure all of that out on my own. But yeah, like, and even the fact that I'm working with people, I'm able to see it more. And I I learn with my clients, whether it's counseling or coaching, I learn with them. And uh, I see things in myself as well, and I try to take care of it because I know where I want to be and I want to get there. So if I need to be like more nice to myself and just take things, you know, one thing at a time and realize, hey, this is hard. Like you're doing a lot. Like in general, it's like you're your mom, your wife, you're running two businesses, you're helping, you know, your run coach with his clients, you're like training for a hundred milers to get in the bad water. It's like be nice to yourself, you deserve it.

SPEAKER_01 32:28

You know what I'm saying? Be nice to yourself. I I didn't know you were a mom too. You're doing everything. My goodness. Everything, yeah. I know open your shade and you're gonna have like a farm out there. You're all sitting here at a farm just getting, I don't know, but uh like sometimes what's that? I I just said what were you gonna say?

SPEAKER_02 32:49

Oh, sometimes I'm so hard on myself, and uh and then I then I turn around and be like, why are you doing all these stupid hard things all the time? Like, why do you have to have two businesses? Why do you have to do all these things? And that's just kind of how I am, and uh the fact that I struggle with my own anxiety, that's a really big driver as well, and I have a lot of awareness into that, and um, I try to not let that kind of stuff creep into my running, and I try to keep running fun, even though I've been like dipping my toes into running competitively since last year. So it's been it's been a lot of fun though, learning to do that. But like trying to see a clear burnout is is hard, but just keeping it light, being nice to yourself, having fun, stuff like that. It's like on today's trail run, I was doing a speed workout, and then on the cooldown, I'm usually running late because I just am so busy. I had to get back for a counseling client, but I was and and I do this like literally almost every run. Like my cooldown is not my cooldown pace, it's usually a minute and a minute and a half faster than it should be because I'm like, I gotta get back, I gotta get back, I gotta get back.

SPEAKER_01 34:20

Even though you know it's 10 minutes, it is gonna be even a slow 10 minutes, or it's gonna be a quick 10 minutes. No, I I get it. You've got to get back, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:29

Yeah, you've got to get back. I was able to slow down today because there was a butterfly, and I had to see this butterfly. And I tried taking pictures of it, but it's like one of those things every time you sneak up on it, it flies away. So that was able to like that was my fun thing, my thing that slowed me down, and yes, I made it home with time to make a protein drink and sit down at my computer and get my notebook out.

SPEAKER_01 34:59

Yeah, and you know, I think as well, what I feel like I'm pinched for time, like you know what? I'm not running the Pentagon. If I'm a minute or two late, I will say I'm sorry, things happen, life happens. You know, we're all so critical on ourselves and other people, they they aren't as critical on us as we are usually. So yeah, I I empathize with that behavior completely. You know, just thinking about I don't remember what movie I was watching, but somebody was like, you know, it's the American dream. Find out what your passion is, then do your passion for a living. You know, that's what you do to make money, and you just torment yourself and you know, until that passion isn't even something you enjoy anymore. And and I just feel like sometimes I relate to that so hard, you know, we put so much pressure on ourselves, and we think we're young. You know, what do I love to do? And I want to follow that you know for my career, and then you do you twist it and choke it to death until it doesn't even resemble the thing that you loved at the beginning.

SPEAKER_02 36:05

Right. Yeah, yeah. And people do that well, they do it so easily with both marathon training and ultra training because those things take the most time to prepare for. It's really, you know, like I started out ultra running and then it formed into it, like it went into a lifestyle, and then it went into a career. And I'm like, wait a minute. Now I have to find a hobby that I don't have time for on the side of what used to be my hobby.

SPEAKER_01 36:41

It's just yeah, that's what that's what's really tough. My sister, you know, she's got a job at a university actually in Pennsylvania. She works remotely, but you know, she's always like, Do you want to sign up for this race? And I'm like, Oh, I'm kind of burnt out. I'm thinking about running right now. Like, I like to run for enjoyment, go out the door, and you know, yes, I'll do I'll do pretty decent mileage, but the thought of lining up for a race right now, I feel just it just it I feel like it's taking my passion and kind of twisting it a little bit. And the competitive element, even though I I did run competitively for a long time, you know, that just kind of I'm afraid of what that might do to the kind of the passion that I've managed to rekindle back into my running. But you know, competition, once you're there and you're in the environment and feel everybody's energy, it's so magnetic and wonderful. And you know, it's almost like you kind of have to force yourself to do uncomfortable things and stop the negative association because it's only going to keep feeding itself unless you stop and break the cycle.

SPEAKER_02 37:58

Exactly. Yeah, yeah, we want to have positive reinforcements with things.

SPEAKER_01 38:04

Uh you know, when I think about people who do ultra distances, you know, obviously you're doing long hours of training, but you're also gonna be out there sometimes for days because it's a stage race. But people who uh, like you said, ultra an ultra-running community tends to attract people who perhaps have had hard things happen to them in life and it's kind of their savior. You know, I think about people who have high anxiety, they have had huge life changes, they've had really terrible things happen. And then when you put yourself into the situation where you're literally out there by yourself and you have nothing else to think about but your own thoughts, like how hard that must be for people who have had trauma like that. It's almost like you're forcing yourself to deal with it, in addition to the really hard thing that you're doing. I'm wondering if the the stimulus of running the race overrides your mind that starts to go into that dark hole, or if the dark hole of the trauma it really comes in, you know, full focus because you're in that really focused by-yourself environment for hours and hours.

SPEAKER_02 39:26

I could see it being that way in waves, like the trauma comes and goes and allows the person to more therapeutically work through it on their own as they're out there, you know, doing this hard thing. Running is such like it's healing for our nervous systems. And it really brings us like into this state where we can kind of work on things, especially if you're in like some kind of flow state. Um, you're kind of just going along and it feels so good. But yeah, you know, running in general benefits our mental health. It helps with PTSD and depression, anxiety, ADHD, eating disorders, grief, like all these different areas. It's really amazing. So it's good that, you know, people, even though you might look at us at it as like I treated one addiction for another addiction, it's it's still a really healthy choice. It's just like, yeah, don't over don't overdo it and get yourself in, you know, a low position, like we've been talking about.

SPEAKER_01 40:37

I think about how people, I was gonna say the female triad, but it's you know, relative energy deficiencies to them right now because it's both affecting every gender. But I think about how often maybe it was more in the past, but treatment for that was to completely cease running if it was like a a distance runner and you know, just have that person shove calories in their mouths. But that is so messed up because you're removing that person, you know. Yes, that person may have an unhealthy relationship with running, and you need to dissect what exactly that relationship looks like, but if it's their lifeline, right, and that seems to be really counterproductive. Have you had situations like cases like that where people are dealing with things like that?

SPEAKER_02 41:30

I haven't had that in my coaching business. I've had uh I have people with body image issues and people who want to improve their relationship with food, and we do that back when I was earning my license, probably around 2016, 2017, something like that. I worked at an eating disorder facility in Virginia, and I did see people like that. And you know what, it it was kind of crazy to me how I was not allowed to talk about running. I would like as a counselor, I was not allowed to to to talk to these female athletes that would come in and be like, hey, you know, let's let's talk about what this means to you. Let's talk about how you can move your body in other ways, how this could be, you know, like all these all these ways that it could probably help. And I was not allowed to say anything at all. And that was just the way that the program was. And I don't know if it was because, you know, at that stage, maybe that they, you know, a lot of the patients were just coming from like an inpatient facility for anorexia. But there were still people, you know, like with binge eating, we could have still had that conversation.

SPEAKER_01 42:54

Yeah, that's that's kind of bizarre to me. I wonder if the protocol for treatment has kind of changed with eating disorders, but how hard that must have been for you to be in that environment and see. I mean, not saying that I don't, you know, I don't know if you've ever had an eating disorder, but I've been in college athletics and seen a lot of eating disorders, had really awful things kind of, you know, I've just I've seen a lot. So that would be really traumatizing for me to see that and to see athletes. Well, it would be hard for anybody to see athletes just that their body's so compromised, you know, and they just they probably they still look at themselves and they think that they're you know not thin enough because the body dysmorphia. But um, wow, that that must have been really difficult for you to do that. But also I hope the protocol has changed for treatment, but yeah, that's just really, really tough because at some point it's We can lie and say, oh yeah, I'm not running because I want to burn calories. I'm running because I love it. But you know, you're running because you want to burn calories. And how can you how can you know the truth when the patients are saying things like that? So I guess maybe their thought process was just shut it down, shut it down until the weight's up, and then maybe let's revisit it. I don't know. But what a damaging thing that must be. How do you how do you come back to rebuild a healthy relationship with running after that, you know? Right, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 44:34

Yeah. Yeah. I guess the protocol was to get their weight back up and get them into that healthy eating pattern, build up those good habits. And you know, making making the right choices, you know, as far as like eating disorder behaviors, you know, you know, battling those things, battling the body image. You know, maybe like all of that was something that was supposed to be done before re-reintroducing to running, but I mean, I still think that it was an important part of the topic that needed to be discussed. But we did like have a protocol for like if they could go on a walk, you know, whether it was daily or once a week, and we would just walk about one mile, and that would be their their activity for the most part.

SPEAKER_01 45:29

No, it's just because it's so much part of their identity, it's almost like watching your identity slip through your fingers when it's taken from you, you know. That's yeah, I mean, that can be said with anything when somebody, you know, they maybe they identify so much with a career and then they lose a job, you know, and then or with some other huge life change, like things that I know that in your your bio, I mentioned like people who experience life changes, you help them navigate that. But I think life change that probably encompasses to a big extent the identity that we have for ourselves. And when that change comes, it's like, who am I? And yeah, that maybe that's what I think about. Is that what you would would say also with life changes?

SPEAKER_02 46:22

Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, there's a identity is a really big piece to that. Yeah, identity and then dealing with the stress that comes along with the transition. It's like, you know, if you lose a job, you have to figure out the finances, you know, you have to apply to jobs and you know, work on your resume and do contact a couple people, you know, like there's a whole list of things that come with having a transition, or or if like you're a new mom and you're you you know, you have to figure out how it basically changes your whole life becoming a parent. So there's just a lot that goes into it, a lot of stress. And uh that's where I think it's important to get help. It doesn't have to be like you hit rock bottom. It's just like, hey, I just need some support here, and you you get some help. And and then when it doesn't even have to be like a long-term commitment, it could just be a few months if that's all you feel that you need help for. It's totally worth it.

SPEAKER_01 47:30

Do you feel like people who are going through life changes like that and their identity is kind of on the rocks, like going into something like ultramarathon running is kind of a lifeline to re-establish their identity? Like I'm an ultramarathon runner.

SPEAKER_02 47:47

I almost feel like ultramarathon running adds too much stress and pressure. If like I know like people turn to it for you know, stress relief and to help deal with things like that. I feel like you're taking uh one hard thing and you're replacing it with another really hard thing. So I don't know. It's like a good and a bad thing, I think. I think like get some help with somebody first and then uh you know, add something like that.

SPEAKER_01 48:21

Last thing that I'd like to ask you about, just because I've heard the phrase imposter syndrome for years now. And I think that it could, well, first of all, if you could explain it in the correct terminology, because I don't want to butcher that, but also can that be applied to athletes because, like we talked about the confidence and lining up on the start line and thinking, wow, I don't belong here, that kind of thing. Can you explain that a little bit?

SPEAKER_02 48:52

I mean, yeah, that's that's like the majority of imposter syndrome, having trouble with that identity. You can have all the credentials, like you could be a doctor and have all the credentials and the experience, and you're at work and you're like, wow, I'm performing surgery, and all of a sudden I'm like, why am I doing this? Who am I to be here? Like performing this surgery, like saving this person's life.

SPEAKER_01 49:16

I think you really don't want somebody to have like an episode like that if they're performing surgery and they're like, What am I doing? I don't know. But yeah, continue.

SPEAKER_02 49:28

Yeah. So it's important to be like, yeah, you know what? I do have the credentials and the background experience to be here, to be doing this thing that I'm doing, and like looking at yourself, like, you know, it's it's I think it's like kind of some strength-based work as well. I mentioned like looking at the positives earlier, but we're also looking at strengths and your positive characteristics, like what do you do well? Why do people like you? You know, stuff like that. And that can be like awkward and uncomfortable for some people. And I do hear some people, so it's usually counseling clients. They'll be like, Well, I don't really like anything about myself. And we have to have a conversation about that and find something, you know, and then work towards the goal. But yeah, for ultra running, like you said, you get to that start line and you're like, wow, I'm actually here. Getting to the start line is one thing, and then finishing the race is the next thing to come. But you you get there and you're like, Oh yeah, you know what? I'm here now. I I guess I belong here. You might have some self-doubt. Of course, that's something else to work on is making sure the self-doubt is that's not how you want to show up to your race. You don't want to have any self-doubt during your race. You want to be there confident and strong, both physically and mentally, and know, like, hey, yeah, whatever comes up, you know, besides like breaking a leg or something like that, that you're gonna finish your race and you're gonna finish it really well because you've you've prepared to do that. You're you're that type of person. You have that mindset. I am that type of person. I'm going to do this, I'm going to get it done. I'm going to reach my goal. I'm going to crush this.

SPEAKER_01 51:31

I think about how I listen to some kind of mindset. I maybe I watched it on YouTube or something like that. But when you said that, it makes me think of the advice that I heard when it was like, when you're in a workout and things are, you know, maybe not going great, you don't say, I'm not going to quit. You say, I'm going to finish. You remove the negative part and you make it into a positive. And it's almost like a brain trick or something like that. But you know, I'm sure there are so many kind of mental tricks that we can do to help ourselves. But, you know, Shannon, I so appreciated talking with you. Obviously, you're very informed and you've got the experience to prove that you know what you're doing as well as the credentials for people who are listening who think they could really benefit from working with you. Maybe they're athletes, maybe they're not an athlete, maybe there's somebody who really wants to start becoming more athletic and just um fit. Maybe they want to go for a walk or a hike. Obviously, you work with people at both ends of the spectrum, but how can they get in touch with you?

SPEAKER_02 52:41

Yeah, yeah. You know, they can go to Finish Stronger Mindsetcoaching.com. I have all of my information on my website. They can contact me via email or they can set up a uh consultation through my Calendly that's on there. And if they're not ready for coaching, I have a whole page dedicated to just a resources and my blog, so they can subscribe to my blog. I try to keep that somewhat, you know, like going, but not at like an annoying rate where you're getting annoyed because you're getting so many emails. I don't do that. So that's you know, one way, of course, like messaging me on social media or connecting with me. You know, we connected via LinkedIn. I talked to lots of runners on LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook, X. And I'm not on TikTok a whole lot. I don't really like TikTok, but I'm on there and it's it. So, but if you message me on there, I'll respond.

SPEAKER_01 53:48

Me and the TikTok. I it doesn't, we don't, yeah. So good for you for having it, but I just don't know what to do with it, you know. But yeah, I think obviously people can tell from the way you're speaking, you're like a very I'm gonna use the word Zen, very calm Zen, but also you mentioned you like to keep things fun, so that's important. And that, yeah, you really do listen to people. And like when you said when somebody you say, well, what do you like about yourself? And they say, Well, nothing. You dig into that and you don't just pass it by. Like you're very intuitive. And if somebody is dealing with anything, obviously you're an amazing resource. Thank you so much, Shannon, for being on the show today.

SPEAKER_02 54:32

Thank you for having me, Hannah.