Moving Forward

With Christmas and my 2015 race calendar quickly approaching I can't help but think about the past and how I got to this point.  I took it on the chin a few times by some of the choices I made, no ones fault but my own and that's okay, I am learning to say this because failure is a part of life, right?  It is.  I have wallowed in self pity and misery for far too long.  I tried to hide it as best I could (the crying and wiping snot on my sleeve gave it away) from those around me but they knew.  I tried protecting my children from it, but they knew.  Kids are more intuitive than we give them credit for.

My bad decisions is what ultimately led me to running, well that and a lot of coaxing from my beautiful wife and brother.  Begrudgingly I set out to run a few times and man it sucked, it hurt bad.
That pain became my drug, I wanted to hurt.  I made sure I pushed myself enough to make it hurt, I felt like I should hurt.  In a fucked up way I found a way to hurt myself without hurting myself.  I may have to charge myself for therapy after writing this.

Dumb luck would change everything.  One day at the library with my two little bookworms I stumbled upon a book on healthy eating and running.  Little did I know that this book would become instrumental in how I ran from there on out, the book was Eat and Run by Scott Jurek.  Jurek is probably the greatest Ultra Marathon runner the sport has ever known.  His story went a lot deeper than eating healthy and running, Scott went back to childhood and told his story.  Although our stories are much different I connected with his insecurities and felt much like me that he was running from something.  It was after reading his story that I decided to run the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, DC and complete the Spartan Trifecta.  His accomplishments are nothing short of amazing and in a way he inspired me to try.  For whatever reason I stopped running from my past and began running towards something, something positive.  My need for self inflicted pain was beginning to fade, the very thing that I used to cause pain was now healing me; that and the love of my wife and best friend.

Ironically the Spartan Races and their obstacles are metaphorically teaching me how to overcome what stands in front of me and I haven't even run one yet.  Find a way to do the obstacle, whatever it takes, if you can't do it, do your 30 burpees and move on.  Sitting there mopping about your inability to complete the obstacle is silly, do the burpees and fucking run!  And that is exactly what I am going to do, I am moving on, no longer defeated, never again.  WannaBEast for now on, hell yeah!

Sorry about the occasional "F" bomb, but sometimes you gotta let it out.  Have a Merry Christmas everyone and thanks for reading, oh and to Scott Jeneen, I love you to the moon and back!  I think I owe you one (thousand ;).

Peace Out