Movement 2029 Challenge

Painting by Yvette Yiadom-Boakye taken by Janet at Whitney Museum in NYC

My Substack newsletter and personal blog’s origin story is quite simple. I wanted to document my daily run streak. On November 14, 2022, I started running at least one mile every day to honor my Dad and Grandmother’s passing. For 271 days, I kept that streak alive. It ended on a jet-lagged day in August 2023 upon arriving in Amsterdam for my annual August sabbatical.

Nearly a year of daily movement taught me more than I expected. It was the most grounding thing I’ve ever done. Each day I witnessed the slow shift of the seasons from winter to spring to summer, feeling the steadiness of routine despite whatever heartache or joy the day held.

I ran my mile whether I was happy, sad, indifferent, anxious, well, or pissed. The sun rose brightly some days, some days were met with rain, snow.  The birds carried on. Nature turned at its own pace. And each day, I ran. A quiet reminder that life moves forward, no matter what’s happening in my heart or mind.

Now, in the early days of 2025, I’ve spent much of it feeling frozen. Stuck under the weight of world events. I should probably mention that I’m a bit of a news obsessive. Some people grow up with football or sports obsessed dads, my dad’s sport’s teams were the Washington post, New York Times, NPR and AM talk radio stations. Presidential debates were our superbowls.

I grew up stepping over stacks of newspapers and magazines, newspapers on tables next to empty tea cups, my dad’s scribbles on yellow legal notepads. He read five different newspapers everyday and no music was played in his car. He listened exclusively to staticky AM news radio in the car. I didn’t set out to be like him, but by college, I realized I had become him. I split my listening time between NPR and music in equal measure.

I say all this to explain why I can’t simply “tune out.” But to keep my news consumption from swallowing my mind whole, I’m starting a new daily movement streak. This time, I’m committing to daily movement until January 20, 2029. To make it break-proof, the minimum requirement is just five minutes a day—though my real goal is to break a daily sweat for at least one hour. The movement can be running, cycling, yoga, or stretching in the kitchen while the rice cooks. Five minutes for the days that feel impossible like that jet-lagged day in Amsterdam.

I’ve seen plenty of advice on how to cope with turbulent times. It all sounds good, but I know myself, I won’t follow most of it. I have a news antenna embedded in my bones and honestly I like being in the know, paying attention. So we will move the news out of my body daily since the body keeps score.  So that’s the plan. Move, breathe, and keep going until 2029. I’ll do a monthly or quarterly round-up of my movement practices and progress on here.