Yesterday, I ran 12k to support 40+ formerly homeless men and women who were also running in the Colfax Marathon here in Denver. I ran the last leg of our relay, so I got to cross the finish line. This felt great. As a bookish person who received her lowest college grade in Badminton, feeling athletic -- experiencing triumph in my muscles -- was very cool and exciting. When I rounded the corner, I saw colorful banners, I heard drums beating, and my heart swelled. I stared at the back of the man who I'd been shadowing the whole race, and decided that I would beat him. So I cranked up Joss Stone, threw my head back, and sprinted as fast as I could.
Here's the thing, though. In my excitement, I mistook something that wasn't the finish line for the finish line. (The line I assumed to be the finish line was actually a blue name-scanner. Announcers read your name from it as you approach the end of the race, and share it with onlookers). So, I stopped after this pseudo-finish line, sweating, panting and very pleased with myself. Woohoo! I flashed a big, charming smile at my friends and the photographers. Except they all started screaming at me to keep running, you idiot.
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Running has really made my life better; I have more energy, and I feel more strong and capable in general. Now, I think I understand why running has proved a very useful tool for our men and women as they struggle to achieve sobriety and self-sufficiency; the benefits of running spill over to all areas of life. First of all, training with a team helps runners to rely on others, and to practice discipine and commitment in community. Second, with every step, runners have to really engage with their own weaknesses, their desire to give up. After physically wrestling, and winning, they feel stronger in mind, body and spirit, and empowered to achieve other goals as well. Third, a long run includes easy patches and rough patches. Expecting and preparing for difficulty might help runners/recovering addicts to prepare for dog-days, when the high inevitably wears off, when practicing sobriety becomes gruelling, depressing and lonely.
As I ran, I ruminated. Really, I thought to myself as sweat poured off my body, as the sun scalded the back of my neck, really I can see why a "journey" or a "race" is such a fitting metaphor for life. Like a good story, a race draws its worth and intrigue from conflict, from pushing (all types of conflict: man v. himself, man v. nature, man v. others (competitors)). Also, in a race, time figures heavily, even tyranically, just as it does for so many characters who wrestle with mortality. And, as I ran, I remarked to myself that the dynamic metaphor of a journey allows authors to project characters' shifting mindsets on the changing landscapes outside.
I thought all of this while I was running. Seriously. As my feet pounded the pavement, I pondered over the metaphors that shape our consciousness. Which is maybe why I neglected to cross the real finish line, which is maybe why I got a B- in college badminton.
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Looking back at my time at Wheaton College, I see now that as an undergraduate, I believed that you should only study a discipline if you could master it. For example, in theatre, I was profoundly unhappy when I wasn't the star. When I got cast in roles I didn't want, I withdrew. I wasn't able to have fun unless I felt like I was the best. My competitive spirit prevented me from seeing that the discipline of WorkOut (our theatre ensemble) was changing my heart and my mind for the better. A second example is exercise: I never ran with people who were faster than me, because it made me mad.
Similarly, from attending some leadership seminars and observing goings-on in my own workplace, I've noticed that the current trend in management is to capitalize on your employees' strengths, and to ignore their weak spots. (Marcus Buckingham, Tom Rath). I suppose this strategy makes sense from an efficiency standpoint. And helping people become the best that they can be is a very worthy goal.
But isn't it dangerous to limit yourself to activities you feel safe and comepetent doing? And isn't it good to learn how to fail or fall? Yesterday, I didn't care about my mediocre race time, or losing to the man in front of me; I was happy just to have ran 7.4 miles in support of a worthy cause. So now, I am wondering about the soul-benefits of an average performance. I wonder about the joy in being content to merely tinker, to dabble, to have a hobby. For anyone -- a writer, baker or candlestick maker -- a hobby requiring discipline (for example, running) expands your sense of what you can do, and helps you in your real "calling" -- or, if you don't care for this terminology, helps you accomplish what you want to achieve in your vocation of choice. Me, I'll never be an amazing runner. Neither will most of these men and women; after years of malnourishment and breaking down their bodies with drugs and alcohol, they'll never run a 3 hour marathon. But running, even painstakingly, gingerly, or slowly, is worthwhile if it gets people out of their heads, helps them feel stronger, helps them to escape homelessness or addiction, or helps them to have fun. So, hobbies, even ones we're no good at, maybe even especially the ones we're no good at, teach us how to be gracious in mediocrity.
Hobbies also teach us how to fail. In engaging a hobby, we escape the sphere of concrete achievement, and live in a new, expanded space where we are free to tumble, to get scraped up. To make mistakes. Who cares ... it's just a hobby! And in falling, we grow stronger. By contrast, when we are trying to get the lead, to write the best essay, we refuse to fall or fail. We hold on too tightly, too determinedly. For example, sometimes I feel my writing is so measured, so careful, so safe, so ... fearful. What would it feel like to write like I run -- gleefully, and with abandon?
Footnote: I read an essay last night by Joyce Carol Oates on how the benefits of running spill over into her writing life. http://www.nytimes.com/library/books/071999oates-writing.html Listen to this: "Running is a meditation; more practicably it allows me to scroll through, in my mind's eye, the pages I've just written, proofreading for errors and improvements. " What strikes me here is that Ms. Oates isn't really running when she's running, is she? She's writing -- her feet just happen to be moving simulataneously. Always, always thinking about a writing project strikes me as very "artistic" -- the author haunted by her art -- but also nightmarish. No rest. When I run, I think I'd like to run for running's sake, for a little bit of a break from words.
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