The Gifts

The Gifts

There are moments you are currently unaware of. They haven’t happened yet. Your job is to make them happen.

It sounds simple, because it is.

How well do we really know ourselves? Often we become a product of our patterns, consciously and unconsciously. The automatic self takes over. This is the self that tells you when to go, when to stop. This is the known and comfortable self.

Without getting too hippy-dippy about the whole thing, here’s what I found out. Here is the secret:

Only when you push yourself to that place beyond comfort will you find those secrets.

There is not one. There are many. They are gifts.

Here’s how I found some of mine:

1-    My first Spartan Race. Climbing a ski hill. Heart pounding. Exhausted. Really unsure if I could finish that race.  I kept moving though. Not fast, but I did.

When done the race I thought I would never do another one. It was too tough. After a week or so, my mind changed as I reflected on it. Who was I in that moment of near quitting? What had I learned?

My lesson there was very simple: keep moving regardless of how you feel. Feelings are transitory. Momentum is not. This was my gift.

The next Spartan Race confirmed this as that hill confrontation occurred but that time I knew the secret.

2-    25K race in the mountains. At mile 11 I started cramping. There was no physiological reason. The cramps coincided with the fact that I had hit my previous longest distance running. It was my mind directing my body to throw up warning signs to stop… that anything past there was madness. I kept going. What had I learned? My gift was this: There are comfort factors mentally that will attempt to prevent me from learning new things. Expect them. Keep moving.

3-    50K race in the mountains. My first ultramarathon. This race had a 20mile exit option. As I ran with a group of people, they decided that they had enough and would be leaving the course at 20 miles. My mind started fighting me then, assuring me that 20 was still a record for me, that today wasn’t the day for the full race. It told me I had done well, but this was too much. Building on the last two gifts, I was expecting this. I listened to the voices, understood them, sympathized with them even… then kept going… into the most demanding part of the race. Alone. When I hit mile 29/32 the gift came that belonged to this race: I realized in complete clarity that I would finish this race, but more importantly: I had not yet realized my capabilities. POW. That was huge. This race that I had built up as the “real” test was just one test, and that there were more. It was a great feeling. That was my gift. The other was knowing how it felt to be visited by the monster that wants you to quit, and the angel that gives you a lift. They both come in races, not always in an equal serving, but knowing they will come, acknowledging both but giving no power to them was the key.

4-    Spartan Race, Virginia. Having done many of these races, I was ready. It was brutal. Hardest Spartan race I’ve done to date. 8 miles of hills and obstacles. I did not question if I would finish. My other gifts kept giving to me and pushed me through. I saw and heard a ton of negativity though, as people struggled with their minds, bodies, and mostly their expectations of what the race would be versus what it was. My gift came: joy. I felt it on that mountain. I smiled and laughed in the hardest parts. I had fun when it was tough and shocked people who were in such a different mind set. I felt bad for them that they were not open to receiving their gifts, and hoped they still might in the race.

5-    100K Race, PA Grand Canyon. This was the mother of all of them all so far. I went in not really worrying about finishing the race. I knew I would. I had hopes for a certain pace and time, but was not really attached to either. My goal was to be present, open, and finish. I was all of those things. My gift in this race was simple: selflessness. 13 hours of running takes a toll mentally and physically. It’s a long day. The sun comes up and goes down and you are still running. You drift away for hours. You become something else. You move to a mental plane far from everything you know. You dream, you disappear, you float, you stumble, you grind, and you become selfless. It’s hypnotic and transcendent.  I suspect it’s akin to deep prayer or meditation. The difference is that while you do this mentally, your body is also doing a difficult job. You cannot disconnect from it. It requires water and fuel. You’re not separating from your body; you’re being parallel with it instead. You exist in both places as the same time evenly, selflessly. You are your mind and your body and that other thing that straddles the two but is separate: the selfless part.

So what is next? What is the next gift? What kind of race will give it to me? I wonder about these things. Must I up the ante? Is there a gift in every race? How do I find it, or do I just allow it to happen. I want to find out more. These gifts have given me strength and understanding that is hard to explain. For those stuck in the routine of comfortable patterns, I implore you to stretch out and find these places. It doesn’t have to be physical. That’s just where I found the right about of silence to discover them. They exist everywhere. Just be open to them and seek them out. They just don’t happen on their own.