Lena Dunham offers insight on starting to run

Lena Dunham, the creator and lead actress of HBO’s series, Girls, and author of the best-selling book, Not That Kind of Girl, is one of Hollywood’s biggest proponents of openness and honesty when it comes to body image and societal expectations.

The actress offered the following truly inspirational post on Instagram, saying that unlike normally, she’s actually not annoyed at this paparazzi photo of her out for a run.

Not usually one to post a paparazzi shot but this fills me with pride. Basically my whole life I have hated running and run like a wounded baby Pterodactyl. It was embarrassing and honestly I did not trust myself to escape a burning building or even move briskly towards a buffet. @jennikonner is directing the season finale of Girls and decided that as Hannah evolved so would her run, so she got me a training session with Matt Wilpers from Mile High Run Club. Within an hour I had a different relationship to this formerly torturous activity. I felt strong, swift and proud. I’m not about to embrace that triathlon life but it’s a true joy to continue getting more connected to my body and its powers. (Extra motivation provided by @manrepeller for @outdoorvoices.) #moveforyourmind

A photo posted by Lena Dunham (@lenadunham) on Jul 29, 2015 at 3:58pm PDT

Good for Lena. Anyone who runs is a runner in our books, even those that run like “wounded baby pterodactyls.”