Post Run Ponderings

I was walking home after finishing my run this morning and as I crossed a street a thought rolled through my head: "I miss the days of being able to run six or seven miles like it was no big deal."

A few months ago--close to six months ago now that I really think about it--we were living in Sasebo and if I said, "I'm going for a quick run" that meant I was going for a three-ish mile run.  Tuesday lunch runs were quick runs squeezed into a 90-minute lunch hour.  Normal runs were anywhere from four to six miles.  Long runs on the weekend were six to eight miles, occasionally longer.

Now I live in the 5k range on a regular basis and there are days where that reality just totally kicks my emotional ass.  Today was one of those days.

I was on the brink of saying, "I shouldn't even think of myself as a runner anymore" when my inner counselor told my inner sad sack to knock that shit off.

What is it about labels?  There was a time when I didn't consider myself "a runner." I was someone who had to run to meet certain physical standards to keep my job and be vital in my work and ministry, but "a runner?" Psh.  Not me!

Then one day I found out I really was "a runner" and it was liberating and kind of frightening all at the same time.  "When did I begin thinking of myself as 'a runner'?"

Of course, maybe I'm just a little too "in my own head."

But I realized that we do this thing with labels in other aspects of our lives as well.  I have seen in first hand in the church.  People hit spiritual rough spots and spend some time away from the church and if you ask them, they would not say they really don't identify with the label "Christian."

What I am learning as I get acclimatized to running in a new location is that I have to take each run as its own experience and its own gift: learn from it, and then get back out there again tomorrow.  The run may not be pretty, and I may not feel "unstoppable" as I suck wind and gasp through my bronchial issues, but it's a run.  Or, as I like to say on my daily mile posts, "at least I got miles."

One of my spiritual mentors once said, "There are times when the daily office will feel like sand in your mouth as you pray it, but by showing up you make yourself available to the Spirit."  That's why I keep lacing up, even when I don't know if it's going to be pretty, even though I'm not where I was one year ago.  By lacing up, I am making myself available to today's run, and today's lesson, what ever that may be.