Wibbly, I wouldn't worry too much about other people's gait. There's tips and tricks to learn I'm sure, but for now, finding your natural rhthym and working with it strikes me as a better bet. I think I have a naturally quite fast cadence, with a low floor clearance and a heavy, thudding, short stride. My feet stay pretty much underneath my body at all times - I never 'stride out' like you see proper athletes doing. I'm more baby elephant than gazelle. Yet when I hit that sweet spot with my rhthym it's like my legs just do their own thing with little actual effort and I can just keep on going like today. My pace isn't particularly fast I don't think, and it's certainly not sub 30mins for 5km (Found, I'm in awe of 27 mins!), but it is consistent - usually between 6m30s and 6m50s per km. Fundamentally I'm a lazy exerciser - I don't like flogging myself to death and will do much to avoid it!
So, do you have a 'sweet spot' rhthym, no matter how fast or slow? Do you ever find that spot where the running feels good to you, where your breathing eases, and there's no lactic acid pain in your thighs? The one thing I've come across in my very limited research online, is that it's actually worth experimenting with reducing stride length and increasing the cadence/beats per minute ie. speed with which your feet hit the ground, in order to increase pace in the long run. I saw it described as feeling as if you're running with your laces tied together. Once foot placement is improved then you can start to increase stride length again to shorten overall times, at least I think that's how it's supposed to work.
Shotgun - I seem to squeee after every run, I can never quite believe I've gone out and actually done it, iyswim. It doesn't matter about distance or time in a way, except as personal goals, it matters more that we do it at all, that we take the time to do it for ourselves, for our mental and physical health. Give yourself a squeee, you deserve it!