Running

This is the last time I ran. It was an early Sunday morning. May 20th. And I only ran for these photos to be taken. I wanted images of me doing something I love most. In a spot I love most. I wanted them as a memory of this transitionary period.

It feels like I am reaching the end of this very long tunnel. An ending whose existence I often questioned. I hope that I don’t find myself eating these words in a few weeks time and find that the light leaks were merely a mirage. And I don’t mean returning to running, though there is that too. Because I’ve begun to recognize that the loss of running, all the injury, all the trying and striving, and resisting and fighting, has not really been about running at all. It’s been about facing my greatest fears of value and wanting to be worthy of being loved. All of this struggle, or most of it, has been in a flee from fear, of never feeling like enough. I have never felt so powerless or out of control as I have in the past few months. I have felt like an alien in my own body no matter what I do. My mental anguish and striving I’d bet has manifested in the physical. The more I have resisted the more my body and spirit have required my surrender. I am still in the tunnel but already I can feel that there is a real shift and real healing happening. I get it now. I get why athletes say injury is the best thing that happened to them while also saying they don’t wish it on anyone, because you don’t. I would not undo what I have gone through. I would not un-lose my muscle and aerobic fitness. I would not un-lose the pounds. I would not un-cry the tears. I would not undo the bleak valleys I’ve ventured into. I have wanted to at times. I have wanted to go back to the girl I was last June physically and emotionally. I have wanted to be someone else. I have wanted magical answers. There will still be many moments when I do. Deep down though, this is not work I want to procrastinate. It would be more painful to sweep under the rug than to keep putting one muddy foot in front of the other.

Running saved me. Then running broke me. But here in the middle of it all, because my journey on this earth is still going, running has given me more than it has taken taken away. If I continue to let go, continue to surrender, I can see not only a way through, but a way of living that has so much more peace, joy, love, grace, space, and as my beautiful friend pointed out, ‘Life will probably be a lot more fun.’

Photo Credit: Lauren E. Lipscomb

I wanted them to be magical birthday miles. They were not. But, I ran them anyways. I stayed committed to them, took them slowly and tried to shake off too little sleep and too much birthday wine from the night before. I wanted to reach the top.

I ran up a mountain on my birthday. By choice. I realize this is a not so humble brag, but I take pride in this fact. 32 was the first year I did a true mountain trail run. The first time I ran up Stone Creek I was afraid. I’d never attempted something like that as a runner. Sure I’d run some hills, some steeper roads with continuous ascent, but never 5 miles of consistent and real elevation gain. Would I have to walk? Would it be difficult? Could I do it? Why did I sign up for a race that I had no experience in? It was only four short weeks a way the first time I attempted anything like the 24 mile mountain race I had voluntarily signed up for. That first trail run was unexpected. It was magic. The trail was incredibly runnable. I liked the continuous ascent. I found bursts of energy in the flatter patches. The lightness of running that feels like flying came over me. So this is trail running, I thought. I was made for this. I was meant to be here on this mountain range. I will never forget that run. I will never forget what I found at the top. Literally, it is one of the most beautiful places I have been in all of my adventures and it’s maybe one of the views I most earned. Not because I ran up a mountain, though there is that too, but because of all the things I had done to be in that spot. It was a series of life choices and doing of the hard things and so much more that brought me to the top of Stone Creek early that Sunday morning, carried only by my own two feet to stand alone and see the world stretch out before me.

Standing at the top of one of my favorite places in the world, I looked out at a view I had not seen since July 1st. It was different. Quieter. Browner. Golden. Was there still snow? There was smoke. But I could still make out the mountains. My imperfect body, one that had struggled with injuries, had carried me up those miles and those few thousand feet on August 19th. It was not a perfect run. Far from it. But I showed up. I did it anyways.

“I am imperfect and that’s ok.”

Those words filled my head as I paused to take in the mountains and valleys and all the life that filled my vision in every direction. For a brief moment I believed them. I stopped measuring myself and every move I’d made that day, that week, that year. My heart really really felt them. Tears dared to fill my eyes. Life felt too good, like it was offering too much wonder and joy and peace for one human to feel. And with the quickness that it came, levity retreated. But I remember how it felt. It’s the same lightness I can find in running. It doesn’t always come around as much as I want but I think I can make it come around more. It’s a lightness that isn’t exclusive to being fit and following a training plan perfectly. Instead, it’s created from the practice of running happy, fully and in the moment. And we could easily swap living with the word running. Because that lightness, it’s the lightness I’m chasing with my life. The kind that makes you want to lay down in the dirt and feel all the little pieces of sand, clay and rock and touch with as much of your living body as much of the living world as possible.

What Running Gave Me

33 at the Top of a Mountain: Finding Levity in Imperfection