In long distance running, the 2-3 hour range, there's a lot of time to think. Lots of time to think and to think and to think. The time is great for working through ideas and concepts and all the good and bad stuff that's going on in your life. But there's something that happens, at least to me, at about the 2 hour mark that turns thinking into therapy.
Around 2 hours into the run I get exhausted. Really exhausted. Each step I take just adds to the exhaustion. Physical exhaustion becomes emotional exhaustion. The emotional walls that keep out the bad thoughts, the pains of yesterday, the thoughts of hurt and anger - those walls come down and I have to face them. I can keep running but I can't run away from myself. Unresolved stuff stares me in the face. They become my running partner. And they don't shut up. They want to talk. They want me to talk. They want to find peace and they don't care if I don't - at least in that moment.
And so I keep running and I keep thinking and the walls keep tumbling down and the conversation continues. And I'm too tired to keep them quiet and I'm too tired to put up a fight and so I listen to what they say to me. They don't shut because they are the ghosts of yesterday and they long to find their peace so they can move onto to another realm. And if I work with them, if I listen, and if I hear where they are coming from they will lead me to parts of my soul that I cannot go on my own. And once there I see the pain and the hurt and without all the distractions and denials I embrace the pain for what it is, for what it was, so that I can keep going forward, so that I can keep running.
Running is as much an emotional game as a physical one. Work with it and the emotional benefits will be as great as the physical ones.
9 weeks of therapy left.
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