Running, Happiness, and Competition

5/26/13
    I have no extraordinary skills, no prize-winning talents or hidden abilities. My intelligence, looks, or social skills do not seem to distinguish me particularly from many of my college peers. I'm smarter than some, but others are certainly smarter than me. Most people seem to believe that life is part of a competition, a competition to get the best grades, get the most friends, get the best job. If you fail, certainly you'll be left behind in a world that doesn't care about you, drowning in an abyss due to your inability to become outstanding amongst the masses.

The thing is, I don't really care about competition. Well, that is, not anymore. For a long time, I care very deeply about competition. It was a bit unhealthy really. I had to set the curve in all of my history classes. I had to put in the most consistent training for running. I had to make varsity. Gradually, though, I saw the price of my competition driven life. It was happiness and self-worth dependent on something I only had partial control over. You can't give yourself more natural intelligence nor can you suddenly acquire running talent. You can of course, expand your God given gifts with tough work and perseverance. But there comes a point where the tough work is drudgery and the perseverance is unrelenting stress. I've reached that point before, and to be honest I find myself on the edge of the line between work ethic and insanity often. But I try to remind myself about life. Life is fleeting, and I could die tomorrow. Zach often just tells me to relax, and he's often brought me back to the realization that life should be lived with happiness in mind. Not of course the fleeting happiness of eating vanilla ice cream (which is delicious) or watching a lot of episodes of the Vampire Diaries (which is a really entertaining show). Though we shouldn't lack appreciation for these small bits of daily happiness, we long for something more lasting- we find true joy in helping others,  in friendship, in love, in family. From my somewhat limited understanding of human life , it seems to me that these loves are what we reflect on as we lay dying. We don't think, "Ah, you know I'm really proud of that one trophy I got." I guess this is all pretty obvious. But its really hard to remember sometimes.

I guess what promoted this quasi philosophical blog post is running. I ran eight miles today. It was happy, and with very step I felt more alive and more myself. Running is a strange sort of hobby, because it brings both instant happiness, and a more lasting happiness that comes in the quiet moments of self-reflection that running brings. I used to be very focused on personal records, competing with teammates, and getting to point where I could finally stop being ashamed of my times. While there certainly isn't anything wrong with wanting to improve running times, it becomes a problem when your best is only good if others think its good. I had numerous 800 prs last year, and I was more in shape than I had ever been in my life. But every race just made me hate myself, and deride the worth of my running. It wasn't as fast as them, wasn't considered fast, and all my effort was for nothing. I was so wrapped up in a competition I forced on myself that I forgot running was fun and brought happiness without the benefit of a fast pr. Today I remember that running is fun, and nothing can change that- even if I run slowly, and stop to inspect a bunch of garden flowers. Which I totally did.