Keep Running

Taking up a cause—personal, professional, artistic—is a significant step in our lives. It may be a decision to lose weight, or get a degree, change jobs, or run a Marathon, and our focus is suddenly riveted toward this singular goal. It may also be a simple change in our habits, like getting up earlier in the morning, avoiding sugary drinks, or taking a walk every day. To be sure, each of these things mentioned requires planning, intention, time, and thought. There will be successes, and there will be times we feel like giving up and moving on to something ‘easier,’ or that this thing ‘really doesn’t matter.’ Except that it does matter, to us. It is easy to become weighed Ure by negative thoughts, and begin to believe that we cannot accomplish anything, much less our personal goal, but if we can refocus on the fact that so many extraordinary things were done by people just like us, just by their perseverance, and not losing sight of where they want to be, we, too, are able to take just one more step.

Life itself is busy and demands our attention constantly. The job, the family, the bills to be paid, all vie for our time. And in the midst of those, we still have personal goals and dreams that keep popping up in our minds at various times. Usually, we smile, and think, ‘Boy! Wouldn’t I love to….’ and then return to what is already in place. Realizing that there is room for both our current life as well as goals, large and small, can help us begin to do those things that really feed us spiritually. It can be really easy to get stuck there and think we can never get close to these higher elevations.

However, whatever life has presented us, we can always do just a little bit more, and edge toward that higher goal, whatever it may be. As a runner, even when hot, tired, and we feel unable to take another step toward the finish line, we find that we are not only able to take that next step, but multiple steps, painful as they may seem, toward a finish line, that sometimes only we can envision.

Whatever causes us to keep running, to keep moving, and to reach our goal, is within us. We may do it for our father, our mother, our coach, someone or something else that lights that fire within us. While having an image of what we choose to become by completing this, there is also a letting go of the doubt, the words of others, and the belief that only Olympians, of whatever sort, might reach this high. As the faith in our own capabilities grows, however, we become more sure of ourselves, focusing on our goal, and not our own doubts, as well as those of the naysayers, in reaching for the stars.

Like those Heroes, Saints, and Legends, we, too, are capable, and responsible, for shaking off the weight of our own concerns, doubts, and misgivings, and simply running our own race. This is the race we were meant to run, as only we are able to run it, and it helps the world continue to see that extraordinary feats are not only possible, but that WE are the ones that can make it happen.