Now I know where you are. You don't have to do it the slow way, the first running-abilty is in a room next to the room with the life-containers it should even be marked on the map with a blinking red light. And you don't have to collect all life-containers but I strongly recommend it because the first boss is near and after the boss you will learn to jump and soon reach the next world with different music and setting. But thats not even scratching the surface of what you can discover and learn .
I hope you will like my game better after that but I can't guarantee it. It's still a matter of taste even so I can assure you that I tried my best to make an enjoyable game but I didn't care too much for conventions and sometimes broke rules of game design on purpose and that might not be for everyone.
You could try the 30FPS Mode. You can activate it by pressing '3' on your keyboard. It might be that your game is running too slow. The 30FPS mode is much lighter on the hardware.