My Old Friend, Perspective

So, the first day of the Steelhead six is over, and I’ve decided that since I don’t know everything, there’s no logical reason for me to assume that I’m in a bad place because I’m freaked out about this race. Fear has a place in all of this guts and tackling destiny thing, and without it, I have to wonder if any great risk would ever be appreciated.

I don’t know if I’m stupid or brave, but I know that one of those two signed me up for Steelhead. I remember sitting there at the registration screen, hovering over "sign up," a click away from a 20-week commitment. In that moment I realized that a lot of who I am was in that minute, and then the decision was easy.

I know what it’s like to cross a finish line after a bunch of struggling, and there’s nothing like that feeling. Clicking on "sign up" buttons before I talked myself out of it brought me to those places. Fear and pain and struggle are necessary to complete the victory equation. I mean, what would really be so great about the victory without those three things? Could it even be called a victory? Over what? What actually has been conquered without fear, pain and struggle? So aren’t the fear, pain and struggle signs that we’re on the right track? Maybe that’s the way to see it all.

I just know that I don’t want to live my life watching other people and wishing that I could have or be what they have or are. I want to make my own way out here, and that’s never easy. I honestly don’t know what flipped my freak out switch – this is the way it’s supposed to be.

And I guess that the only way to get over the fear is to go through it – and no matter how much that 13.1 run hurts, I’ve been there before and I’ve lived through it.

That marathon hurt a lot for about nine miles, but I’d still be feeling a DNF. Physical pain is finite.

Yeah, I’m almost ready, Steelhead.