Why do I run? I’ve been asked that question several times. The easy answer is that I run simply to stay in shape, or simply for the serenity of running. Others I’ve heard is that running provides a sense of balance. People tend to treat running as a side to a well-constructed diet. You have your running, your work, your weights, your diet, your relationships, etc. A sense of balance.
But I have space here, and you’re reading, so let me give a fuller answer.
When I run, I feel like I’m meeting an old friend. Someone reliable, someone I have to work with, someone who can take me places I want to be and that can help me experience old, familiar feelings and ones I’ve never felt before. The process take extended concentration, at times, that isn’t the incarnation of patience, exactly…sometimes it’s a steady beat of shoes steadily hitting the pavement. Or a mad rush towards a certain point, followed by a slow, relaxed gait, then a rush again.
The other nice thing about running is that all the problems from your problems and stress and anxiety comes out through your legs, freeing your mind to think with more straightforward clarity. And your mind — as it’s telling your legs to move, your arms to pump, your body to lean forward — is more active and alive. Broader and more passionate, and yet more focused and sober.
Then there are the little, technical things that make running a practical art you viscerally experience. When I first starting running, I was getting faster, but my knees began to hurt. Eventually, I had to stop. Then, one day, in Barnes and Noble, I was browsing through this book called “The Tao of Running.” It said that knee pain was caused by improper running, running that was too tense and not quite relaxed enough. So to nurse my knee back to health and strength, I changed my stride according to what I read in the book. Landing on the heel of your foot, as I was doing before, drives the full force of your coming down on the ground straight through your leg, without cushion. The remedy for that was to land on the balls of my feet and absorb the force as the foot came down. This was easier when I leaned my torso forward. To nurse my knee back to health, I also made sure my knees didn’t go past my leaned-forward torso, as the book suggested.
And the book also emphasized small strides, as well as intentionally absorbing your gait by bending your knee slightly with every strike of the ground. Finally, running regularly made you less prone to injury, as it helps your muscles get used to the routine over time. If you run three miles once a week, you’re not necessarily getting stronger and your tendons get a shock every time you run – as opposed to if you run a mile a day and work your way up from there. Finally, it was necessary for me to get new shoes. I had to get shoes that fit my arch, that felt comfortable, that felt “natural” (that didn’t seem to put my foot in an unnatural position), that were relatively light, and that encouraged me to land on the balls of my feet as opposed to my heel.
This was not a chore for me in the least. I wouldn’t call it “fun” exactly, either. It was an art. It was a calm, solitary act. It felt like restoring the relationship I had with running. It’s hard to describe, but it was peaceful and it made me feel alive. The whole routine – from the getting the shoes, to the concentration on my stride.
I ran with the new advice…and discovered to my joy that I had no knee pain. I kept running…
Because running heightens my senses and focus, and because it leaves me free to be emotional and express all my anxiety and thought and drive through my constant movement, my favorite thing to do is listen to music and run. Listening to music while running allows me to drown in the music, to feel every tear of yearning in Rihanna’s “Stay,” or the drive in Drake’s “Forever,” or the constant steady drumbeat in The Proclaimer’s “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles),” or the overwhelming release in Florence+ The Machine’s “Shake it Off,” or…the environments of a zillion other songs. I can live a life in every song. I feel as if my heart is replaced with the melody as my mind relaxes and consumes the words, and it comes out through my whole body in a pace driven by the music. Sometimes steady, sometimes furtive and desperate, sometimes calm and meditative…moving through my life.
So that’s a major reason I run.
Some people say they don’t care about competition. I do, by choice, and within reason. One thing about friendly competition I’ve noticed is that it can encourage other people to run –which indicates to me that others are competitive, too. Also, running with other people just lets you cut loose and compete. I mean, in day to day world we have to be polite, you know? Like, dot our I’s, cross our t’s in the office, filter what we say in social situations. Hold back. Here, in running – you can let go. See the person ahead of you? You can pass him. Nothing’s between you and him – no real rules or bureaucracy – it’s just you, your body, your drive, and the trail. Go ahead. Engage the competitive urge. Let your legs fly. Grit your teeth. Feel the intensity of the music in your eardrums take over your being. Drive forward. You’re free to compete. You’re free to move your body to its limits.
But even this is really about you. Oftentimes, the person in front of you doesn’t give a shit if you pass them or not. This is your personal goal. And it’s really healthy, usually, to focus on the person ahead of you instead of worrying about those behind – if you’re competing at all (which is why that person ahead of you, again, probably isn’t paying attention to you). Passing that person, then – that’s your thing. That’s your goal.
So yes, I compete against others, but I compete largely for and against myself.
One thing I’ve found is that running goals gain weight as you work for them. Like, I wanted to beat my former PR. The more I worked to beat it, the more it meant to me. Same with placing higher at races.
I also like that running is a fairly pure sport. Biking, you need a bike. Most sports require a ball of some sort. Running, technically speaking, you could do naked (and some people do, haha). It just seems like a pure activity. I have a kind of pride when doing it that I’m just using my own body, without props, to move forward. Feels good.
There are other reasons I could give. Maybe I’ve wanted to run ever since my dad soundly beat me when I was around ten years old, running a race through the woods on a camping trip. Maybe it was those races I ran with my homeschool peers around 12 years old. Maybe it was that mile I ran at 14 from the Suisun City (in CA) library (my favorite place then) to the house my parents had at the time – and the fact that the mile took ten minutes and I swore to myself that one day I’d run faster. Maybe it was because I wanted to be able to run with my sisters (and got to a couple times) when they were doing track. Maybe it’s the fact that I’ve always liked to walk outdoors to think, and it was not unusual for me to travel a couple miles in the darkness to ease my brain during undergraduate years. Probably all of these experiences and goals and dozens more.
Some people I run with are in their late sixties and early seventies, and still pretty fast, still running many miles a week. There’s a light in their eyes I don’t see in the eyes of many people – their age or younger. Something youthful and confidently alive. All those years running – I think it gave it to them. It’s like running is an old friend that has gathered experiences with them and stuck by them through the years…and when you’re running, you’re living all that life again in every stride, altogether. It makes your eyes twinkle.
And to get there without making mistakes that cripple your knees over the long term, you do have to treat running like an art form. You have to know the shoes, the stride, how to take care of your body, the frequency, the technique. It’s almost like a deeply joyful, meditative routine.
My goal is to run till I’m in my seventies, and one day look over some path — maybe the Trinity River, however it looks then — and think of all those years and memories, and smile. It’s a personal goal. Doesn’t mean much to anybody except myself. And that will make that moment even more valuable, especially as I work at it more and more.
It’s about midnight. 72 degrees outside. I’m feeling like my mind is coming awake…the world around me is peaceful, quiet. I’m in a room with a steadily blowing air conditioner, typing on my computer…
I like running at night, especially, because running at night feels more free. It feels like I can imagine a bit more, like I’m more isolated…the world around me seems to fade and the world created by the motion and my own sense of self and history, all mixed in with the music, and shoes hitting the ground — that world where imagination and reality meet comes alive. Like a blank piece of paper or easel, the hours of the night are there, filled with promise, beckoning me to live in the composition of my heart’s dreams….
Enough talk….time to lace up.
All pictures are self-taken running photos.