What the heck was over there? Did he not realize he could get pulverized by a freakin semi..?
Nah..he knew. You see the chicken had it all figured out.
The chicken knew that a key aspect in genuine happiness and contentment has got to be a disciplined life- a life riddled with pain, struggle, heart ache, disappointment, failure…but only because that’s just a SMALL part of it.
& not the whole thing.
We’re just like that chicken.
Because we fight our way to the light at the end of that deep dark tunnel. We risk the “what ifs” and “I might not make its”. By doing so, we gain more than we ever could have imagined when we get to the end of that struggle— accomplishment, success, understanding..Which is certainly feelings that every human being (and maybe chicken) yearns for.. strives for.. craves.
So we run across the road-
Do we want to get to the other side, and know what’s there?
Sure..
But we realize something on our way over…
And maybe this realization is exactly why we all fall so deeply in love with running ultras?
Maybe this is why we all put up with the endless hours of mind-numbing relentless forward motion. Hours of torture, stress, and feelings of self defeat- all falling in heaps on our plates.. Just to keep going to the other side.
Because when we look back after we do cross that road- or maybe finish line- we know how awful the hours leading up to it were. We know that we had to stay disciplined. We had to stay tough. We had to grit our teeth, put our heads down, and just fight our way to the finish- simply because we wanted to accomplish something come hell or high water. To prove to ourselves that we could.
And maybe that journey reminds us of life, and how things really work in the grand scheme of things. We gotta work our butts off for what we want and need in life::: no matter how agonizingly tough it is. We know if it’s worth fighting for, we’ll fight…. We mimic these moments during those long awful runs.
And when we dig deep within ourselves and REALLY push, we open our eyes to these thoughts & explore the endless ties ultrarunning has to our lives.
& We can’t ignore the metaphors.
It’s more than just running and playing in the woods. It always is. Its gotta be. The parallels to life are infinite…and that’s probably why we keep doing it, keep pushing through the pain-inside and outside of running.
We persevere just to get to the other side!
But we know it’s not really about the other side…
Nope. The chicken knows..
..It’s the satisfaction of the long journey to get there.
Gosh I Iove ultrarunning.
ASHRUNS100s 