Whether anyone admits it or not, we all have something from which to run. It's only instinctive for us to run away from these things, to bury them beneath months of training, to put miles between ourselves and whatever is giving chase. These things from which we run often divulge the most true and most intimate parts of our individual selves. Whatever it is though does not matter, for it causes this flight, this run. Beneath the things for which we run -- exercise, pleasure, championships, fulfillment, health -- are these things from which we run.
It's a natural response to run from. But is it the best one?
The flight is singularly motivated by whatever it is we're running from. If this a response for survival, are we really surviving so much as biding our time? In fleeing try to outlast that thing. There is no direct confrontation, no true effort to defeat whatever is giving chase. Though we may wish to, we cannot possibly run forever. The flight cannot indefinitely last, for the thing from which we run gains, and we cannot help put slow up at some point, exhausted. Entirely spent. Momentum lost. Legs locked.
There's something ineffective about running from, and it seems to arise from its isolated state. No one else can run away That's the fundamental difference between running from something and running for something. A singularly motivated solitary flight and a highly dynamic fight for survival.
Running for something implies the thing for which we run is essential, necessary for survival, necessary for simply being. For years I had a team for whom to run, to provide the motivation when I lacked it, to push me harder when my legs and lungs didn't want to respond. Coming to college without a season and a goal race and team did not undermine my love for running, but it certainly made me question what I was running for. For a while, I admit, I was running from a sense of failure, from unfulfilled goals, from an unsettled feeling about what I had accomplished and what I wanted.
And only when I flipped that flight, giving chase instead of being chased, did everything change. When we start we running for things, there's an inevitable increase in momentum. While the impulse of the flight derives from a single source, the motivation of the flight is , gathering momentum from everything that supports it. I realized that during my first marathon -- that I was running to finish, but I was running for more than myself. Though my legs were beginning to lock and my body was spent, momentum was not lost. We may run for a single goal, but we run for the things which support us and our flight, the things which motivate us.
I might've been running for that finish or for a time goal, but I was running for so much more. For my family who have supported me and this often ridiculous thing I love. The team and the coaches who inspired and challenged me. The friends who don't necessarily understanding why I run, but who certainly accept me for it. The friends who listen to me occasionally talk about splits and races and elite runners. The roommates who haven't been angry with me as I struggle to pull on running tights on dark winter mornings. The roommates who haven't thrown my out for wearing short shorts around the dorm. The regulars I see on my runs, whether back home in Duryea or here in Boston, in whom I find comfort, whether they acknowledge me or not. The friends-and-fellow-runners who have challenged with me or passed miles with me.
And in these next few months, I'll find myself running for Boston. A city and a sport with an incredible tradition of resilience and strength. The Wellesley Education Foundation. Something more than a race.
Everything changes with that realization - that we're running for so much more.
With all that momentum, anything seems possible.
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