40 Days to Better: Day 37

Today's run was a 3x3200 workout with someone taking pictures for a story that is supposed to appear in the Baltimore Sun tomorrow.  The 3200 meter intervals were each run in 13 minutes or less (12:57, 12:56, 12:53).  With a somewhat burning sore throat and a small amount of congestion, I didn't think I would make it through the third one at that pace.  But I managed to.  I had a friend encouraging me and I dug as deep as I could to make sure that all three met the goals we had set together and run together over the past month.  It was an awesome feeling.

It was a lesson as to what it takes to dig deep.  Having someone nearby who cared about whether I dug deep certainly helped.  Having someone nearby who challenged me to dig deep.  Having someone nearby who was digging as deeply as me.  

This speaks to me about collaboration as well as about digging deep.  When it comes to running, it has been a wonderful collaborative experience ever since preparation for marathon number 1.  More collaborative sometimes.  Less collaborative others.  Right now, I am missing the constant collaboration I had for a while and running a lot of miles alone.  Still, I persist.

Collaboration is always more fun for me when I am being helped and challenged and that the person with whom I am collaborating is just as challenged.  (On that point, my fellow runner this morning may not have been exactly just as challenged, but he was working pretty hard.)

This can be done at work.

This can be done in volunteer activities.

This can be done in a marriage.

Each of them involves collaboration sometimes.  Each of them involves doing things on my own at other times.

On the alone times, I think about silence.  With so many meetings and so many relationships to nurture, silence can be good.  The other morning I commented about liking going out running and hearing the city awaken.  Just yesterday when I walked my dog before my run there were no cars.  And I thought of the song we sing at church sometimes, Sacred Silence.  A reflective time.  A serene time.

In that moment of sacred silence in my life, I thought of the Boston memories coming back to me one more time this past weekend.  I finally received my completion certificate and the record book.  It is an amazing document.  But all the memories of the day and what the experience has meant and continues to mean to me, and my story telling through blogging, and the definition of what matters in my life, came rushing over me again.

This time they passed quickly.  Helped by the moments of sacred silence I sometimes steal.  

But I realize, again, that in my life, the fact that I was there in Boston that day will always be a part of me.  I can never completely leave it behind.

It will affect me and ultimately all with whom I collaborate.  

That was a day when I tried to dig deep but felt I had nothing left at the end.  Today, I dug deep and had something.  I never want to feel like I have nothing left to give ever again.  There is always more.  And trying harder over and over again is what makes me who I am.  

I will still fail sometimes.

But it won't be for lack of trying. 

40 Days to Better: Day 30

This morning, I ran what I can only describe as one of my most incredible track workouts ever.  I ran 4x2400 (that is six laps for each interval), with my friend Brian who is aiming for a sub-3 hour marathon.  We ran each of the six lap intervals at a 6:30/1600m (approximately a mile) pace.  It was a great workout with a wonderful sense of accomplishment.  

During the workout we had another Back on My Feet affiliated runner do the first 1200 of each 2400 with us.  He ran the same pace as us.  Brian commented on not feeling like he could possibly complete the workout when he woke up but realizing that we had planned the run for today came out.

While I didn't express exactly the same thing, I did note that after the large dinner I had at the Lebanese Taverna last night, the lamb still felt it was sitting in my stomach.  As a result, I didn't think I would be able to complete the workout either, but came out because we had planned it together.

This is a minor example of having to make the type of choice I described yesterday--between walking away and trying harder.  This was just about a hard workout, but nevertheless a simple run.  Still, it was a challenge that both Brian and I rose to meet.  

That is a lesson for me.  In things where I can complete a task myself, I can simply choose to rise to the challenge.  It could be running still.  (Although life is not all about running.)  It could be about work.  It could be about teaching.  Walking away in these cases would mostly be a disappointment to myself.  Perhaps to a supervisor or coworker or student.  That is not to say that I would completely discount these relationships.  I see my work as a fundamental part of me.  I see my teaching as a fundamental part of me.  And I see my running (particularly after getting a tattoo) as a fundamental part of me.

But there are many activities in life that take more than one person to complete.  Those include parenting, marriage, and friendship.  In many of those cases, both people need to rise to the challenge.  But in those cases, if I don't rise to the challenge and try harder than it doesn't matter if the other person does.  

Sometimes the goal is not as clear as a specific time in running.

I am lucky enough to say that I have been able to meet many of my running goals.  Sometimes, the goals is not as easy to reach as my running goals.  

But at the end of the day I have to remember that it is worth trying ten times (or more like one hundred times) as hard to preserve positive interpersonal relationships than to reach any running goal.

In the end, very few people will care how fast I ever ran anything (other than I ran Boston fast enough not to be near the chaos).  However, many people will hopefully remember me fondly when I am gone.  We have had numerous retirements/leavings in the business school since I joined and it is overwhelming to hear the respect that many of my colleagues have earned.    

That only comes from consistently trying harder rather than walking away.  

So, I go on the road to better attempting to consistently make the right choice.  But admitting that there have been plenty of wrong ones.  

40 Days to Better: Day 29

Today, I ran only 2.3 miles.  A very short recovery run.  As I noted on Facebook this morning with only an 8 mile run at only an 8 minute pace, I really didn't have much to recover from.  In any case, the run felt very good and I am ready for a great (hopefully) track workout tomorrow morning.

Today, a friend posted on Facebook a picture of a piece of paper ripped around the edges with the following words written on it: "One of the hardest decisions you'll ever face in life is choosing whether to walk away or try harder."

This is an interesting thing to consider.  Specifically, there are a lot of times when just walking away might be easier.  A test of character is when there is a choice.

When a person could walk away.  When a person could throw in the towel.  There may be many temptations to leave something behind.  When it would be simpler and less time consuming just to give up.

It can be a lot harder to carry on.  To try harder.  To work to make things work.

It is a challenge.

It takes guts.

It takes a lot of effort.

It takes caring.

It takes consideration.

I am not perfect.

But I try.

And I continue to try harder.