My Return to Bib Numbers and Spiritual Inspiration

I wasn’t sure if I’d run the full Baltimore Marathon at the year’s start.  I committed to the JFK50 miler early.  The Baltimore Marathon is just four weeks earlier.  One of my two friends running the 50 is doing the full as an easy training run.  I'm doing the full with one goal—for the second year in a row, pace a first-time marathoner to a Boston Qualifying time.  It would be a great accomplishment.  At the moment, I’m confident but not cocky.

I’ve used my bib numbers to look for inspiration ever since my first marathon in 2010 (#1313).  This year, I was assigned #840.  If I look to my closest at hand spiritual reference book (The Catholic Bible) and use the numbers 8 and 4 (leaving out the zero), we find in the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 8, Verse 4:

His disciples answered him, “Where can anyone get enough bread to satisfy them here in this deserted place?”

This was in the context of trying to feed a crowd of 4,000.  They had a significant self-doubt.  Jesus followed up by telling them, essentially, “yes, we can”. Through faith (at least the story goes) they were proven wrong.

So, I sit in my office after picking up my bib number and think about running on Saturday. I have more self-doubt about this marathon than any other in a while.  Not about finishing. About accomplishing the big goal of matching what I did last year when I paced another runner to a Boston qualifying time in her first marathon.  Different day.  Different training season.  Different set of races for the year.  Both partners from Back on My Feet. Each valuing the idea of experienced company on her way to her own goal. 

I know one thing—I have run a LOT of miles this year.  I have continued running with Back on My Feet some this year.  Running continues to make a difference in my life.  Through running, I try to have a positive impact on other people’s lives. 

Now, I just have to put my own faith in the fact that I have trained enough. I just have to execute.  Get the doubt out of my mind.  Be confident.  Say a prayer.  And go.

The picture shows this year’s bib number and a book someone loaned me today.  How interesting that on a day of some self-doubt in one area of my life, a colleague gave me a book about discovering my signature voice to master my leadership presence and, implicitly, leave behind self-doubt.  Time and again, I think I have found my voice when it comes to running and employing running to improve my life and the life of those around me.  The challenge is taking my trust in success as a positive runner and turning it into something that I can use in the workplace to make the lives of the team I work with and the students we serve better. 

We’ll see how it goes.