Many years ago I ditched the more traditional road running for a journey that would take me onward and upward through the endless network of trails covering our remarkable planet.
Along the way, the mission has always been simple:
- go outside
- be in nature
- see as much as I can as I travel great distances using my own two feet
The mission is an endless journey, one with no finish line, yet one that I continue to move through with the simple intention to keep moving forward.
Along such a journey, there is a need for some sort of structure, and to create motivation and form direction we set goals for ourselves – those that will continue to move us forward.
To where, exactly?
I don’t know – and honestly, it doesn’t much matter.
But what does matter is that the goals are set and the steps are taken through to the very end, enabling us to experience the whole that is this experience for whatever it is.
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Training Runs
A few weeks ago I ran a half marathon. 13.1 miles along the roads – down to the far point of town and back up and around, legs and lungs burning as I kept moving up the long hills.
All-the-while, not the happiest that I was here on the roads instead of out on my beloved trails – the ones so close, yet so covered in ice and mud as not to be touched.
I kept running, splits slowing by the mile, making it take ever longer to reach home and the sweet rest, water, and nourishment that would find me there.
Now, why would I do such a thing?
Isn’t that the question I ask myself all the time.
I ask myself it before I head out. As I’m nudging myself to get dressed and put on my shoes, I’m asking myself why I really need to go out and do this.
I ask myself the question as I’m covering the first miles, questioning whether I am really going to cover all 13, or whether I can turn around at my shorter 2 mile mark.
A 5 mile run – that sounds reasonable. That sounds healthy. Why would I make it 13.1?
There are plenty of reasons not to.
But none of those matter right now. What does matter is the challenge directly in front of me. And that, for the moment, is taking step after step until my watch signals that the 13.1 target has been hit.
And I know that my feet will continue to move forward until that is all said and done.
I know that, because I’ve learned my lessons from my past, and I know the feelings that accompany cutting it short of achieving the goal I had set for myself – no matter how arbitrary – and heading home. They’re feelings I never want to replicate, and so I continue onward, step-by-step, until my watch tells me I’ve hit 13.1 miles worth of steps.
Turning Around
A few years ago, shortly before the chaos of 2020 started unfolding, I found myself out in my favorite place on Earth. It was a big deal to be here, because, well, working a corporate job in a city far away, I couldn’t just show up here whenever I pleased.
I was here, out in the San Juan mountains, eager to cover as much ground as possible across this remarkable mountain range.
I didn’t have much time, but I was ready to enjoy it all fully.
Sadly, the trip didn’t live up to my desires, as one hike after another brought me to dark places that I was now being forced to see.
Had I been willing to look at the reality if things earlier on, then I probably could’ve avoided these painful situations out here in this beautiful space. Yet, here I was, the power of the land awakening things that needed to be seen.
On the last day of the trip I set out for one of my favorite peaks. I’d climbed it before and was eager for another summit before heading home. The day was nice out – no clouds to chase us off the peak.
So onward we climbed, one step after another, until we reached the crux of the climb. There’s a part here where things get tricky and a wee bit sketchy (as in, climb up a small chimney, step out onto a slab, and take the few short steps without sliding off towards the 1,000 foot drop).
No matter, though. I’d done it before and I’d done far scarier maneuvers.
I could climb through it no problem.
Yet, here I was, not really wanting to do the move and reach the summit, and when my partner voiced that he, too, didn’t want to keep going, I did something I’d never done before.
I said okay, and I turned around.
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Often times on a journey out there Chasing Upward Slopes, there comes a time when a tough decision must be made to turn around. Perhaps the conditions aren’t right and there is serious danger. Perhaps something has happened to your body and you need to get back to safety.
It’s times like these that we must make important assessments of the situation and, when needed, make the tough call to turn around before the summit.
This wasn’t what happened out there that day on the trails.
Everything was good. There was no real risk of continuing. We had plenty of time.
Instead, something darker was at play.
My own light had gone out, and I let this darkness that set in turn me around and take me back down the trail away from the things that I knew lit me up and set my heart afire.
I turned around, and in doing so was hit hard with the strong realization that I was no longer truly living.
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It took some time to reignite my fire, but through heaven and hell I battled my way back to it.
With the many ups and downs and twists and turns, I got out of the city and made it back home to the mountains – and back to all that comes with it.
Including, of course, icy and muddy trails and a need to continue to run as I trained for races later in the year.
In regard to training, this week the need was something to the extent of going on a 13 mile run.
Now, as an ultra runner, I am no stranger to running 13 miles. It’s normal for me to load up my pack with plenty of water and snacks, lace up my running shoes, and head out to the trails for a few hours.
What I have been a stranger to is road miles. Long ago I ditched the pavement for the trails, and since then I’ve never looked back.
Well, that was until I moved to a town with a real winter and was now being forced to stay off the muddy trails coated in slick ice.
Until the spring weather comes and the snow stops falling, I’m out here, back on the roads that I thought I had given up. And as I’m here, let me tell you, a road 13.1 is very different from a trail 13.1.
Out on the trails the time flies by as I become one with the nature surrounding myself. It’s easy to lose myself in my thoughts and the beauty of the world around me.
Out on the roads – I’m constantly on the lookout for cars and other obstacles. The concrete is pounding at my feet. The natural world is minimized as I’m overwhelmed by humanity.
Here on the roads, the focus becomes the pace. Keep moving; keep pushing.
Some people are really into that. I am not one of those people.
So why, again, am I here running 13.1 miles through town?
The questions come most fiercely as I’m covering those last miles. As my energy has depleted, the contractile force of my muscle fibers have been exhausted, and the pace keeps slowing.
Why did I make that commitment to be out here doing this?
The question arises again, this time more fiercely.
And just as the question begins to fade, the answer gently arises to the surface.
Flashes of moments cresting the top of ridge lines up high in the mountains, the ones that I’ve greeted in the past and the ones that await me in the future.
Flashes of that moment I crossed the finish line in my 100k, and another glimpse of what it may feel like to break my PR on my next 50k.
These moments – they’re special. They light me up and give me the power to continue moving forward, one step after another.
These moments are what I’m out here training for.
But these moments – they are also far off. And as the pain grasps my quad once more and the pang of serious cardiovascular fatigue sets in, I ask myself what I am doing here, out on the roads, pushing for these last couple miles.
It could be done and over with. 11 miles is just about 13. Does it really matter if I spend the next 20 minutes figuring out how to make a few more loops around the neighborhood to hit some rather arbitrary number?
Probably not.
But what does matter is me, here, in this moment, with a goal I set for myself and a commitment to achieve it.
Because whether it’s two more miles or twenty more miles, I had told myself I’d be here and (given that no potentially serious danger arises) that I would go through the entire experience for all that it is. Whatever it is.