I got into triathlon thinking it would be a way to stay fit.
And I guess it is. I’m in better shape than I was before.
But that’s kind of become the side effect.
What I didn’t expect is how much it would change the way I relate to myself — how I handle stress, how I respond when things feel hard, how aware I am of what’s going on in my body from moment to moment.
Each part of it gives me something different.
SWIM — Breathing
Swimming is where I become aware of my breathing. In the rest of my life, it happens in the background.
When I’m sitting at my computer for most of the day, I don’t always notice what’s happening in my body. I’ll be deep in a paragraph or an email, trying to get it just right, and at some point I realize I’ve been holding my breath. Not dramatically — just subtly. It’s like I’m bracing against something invisible.
I think a lot of adult life feels like that. You’re juggling decisions, responsibilities, expectations — and you don’t always realize how much tension you’re carrying because that’s just normal life.
Swimming interrupts that.
The first few minutes in the water are always humbling. My breathing is off. My stroke feels rushed. The water doesn’t automatically soothe me. It forces a choice: focus and settle, or rush and unravel. If I don’t breathe properly, if I rush, if I don’t time it right, I feel it immediately.
So I slow down. I turn my head and take one breath. I let it out slowly underwater. I start counting strokes. There’s something about the repetition — inhale, exhale, reach, pull — that widens my chest again. The thoughts don’t disappear, but they lose their sharp edges.
Swimming reminds me that breathing isn’t automatic when you’re stressed. And when I leave the lake, the ocean, the pool, I feel like something inside me has expanded, the way a balloon slowly fills when you stop pinching the opening.
CYCLING — Going Places
If I’m honest, without cycling my world can become very small. I can live within the same five blocks for weeks — home, the coffee shop, the grocery store, back home again. It’s efficient, but it’s also constricting. My routines get tight. My perspective narrows without me realizing it.
Cycling changes that.
When I clip in and start pedaling, the city opens up in a way that feels earned. Distances that once felt far become manageable. Neighbourhoods connect. Hills that look intimidating from a car become something I can climb with enough patience.
It reshapes my relationship with Vancouver. I feel like the city is riding with me, not just around me. The wind shifts near the water. Roads I’ve driven a hundred times suddenly have texture. I stop skimming across the surface and begin to feel its contours. The place stops being a backdrop and becomes something responsive, something I’m in silent dialogue with.
The city still gets on my nerves — drivers who don’t signal, tourists stepping into traffic without looking, random construction that reroutes everything. It can be inconsiderate and unpredictable, like a friend in a bad mood. But moving through it this way, feeling all of that up close, makes the relationship deeper.
Cycling gives my thoughts somewhere to stretch. I don’t have to solve anything while I ride. I just keep turning the pedals, letting the road unfold in front of me. My focus stays narrow and immediate, and gradually the mental noise spreads out. By the time I get home, my mind feels at ease — like it’s been gently massaged back into place.
RUN — Finding the Line
There’s a point in almost every run where I start to turn on myself. My legs feel heavier than they should. My breathing gets louder. I become hyper-aware of how far I still have to go. And then that voice shows up — telling me I’m not as fit as I thought, that I should’ve trained harder, that maybe I’m just not built for this. It asks why I’m even trying.
The worst part is how convincing it sounds — and how familiar.
It sounds a lot like the voice that shows up during regular life — when I’m overwhelmed by responsibilities, or stuck on a problem I can’t immediately solve, or just tired of being competent for one more thing. There are moments in adulthood where I quietly wonder if I have anything left to give.
Running gives me a controlled space to meet that feeling.
Out there, the discomfort is clear. It’s physical. It rises predictably. And instead of avoiding it, I practice staying with it. I pay attention to where the real limit is and where the imagined one is. I learn the difference between “this is hard” and “this is impossible.”
Most of the time, it’s just hard.
So I keep going — not heroically, just steadily. One step, then another. And with each kilometer, I’m collecting evidence. Evidence that I’m a little stronger than I was a minute ago. Every stretch where I don’t stop becomes a small receipt I can carry with me: I’ve been here before, and I kept moving.
That memory carries into the rest of my life. When I’m frustrated or unsure or stretched thin, I recognize the sensation. It’s the same edge. And I know that I can stand on it without immediately stepping back.
Running doesn’t make life easier. But it makes me more familiar with discomfort.
And sometimes, that familiarity is enough.
I don’t think I’m doing this to check things off anymore.
It’s become more of a routine. Something I come back to that helps keep me steady as life keeps changing, as new challenges come up, as I try to find some kind of balance.
Not perfect balance. Just enough.
So I’ll keep doing this. And I’ll keep sharing what that looks like — trying to balance a bit of freedom with the discipline it takes to keep going.
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Elliot Chan 