I’m sending prayers, love and support to the people and families that were affected by yesterday’s events.
It’s made me think about running and my motivation to run. It started as an individual endeavor to push myself to surpass personal limits I never thought I could achieve. As I continued, I noticed that as I started running longer, faster, smarter, and stronger, I started proving myself wrong all the time. I would challenge those limits that I had set myself with new goals and personal bests.
There’s so much more to running because it gives so much more than you expect. It used to be just for myself. Then I ran for my friends and family. Then at my first 10k, and again at my first half marathon, you see others who are motivated by their own reasons, and a community comes together to support each other despite the difficulties everyone has in their lives to test their own personal strengths with one goal in mind—the finish line.
But I noticed too as I reflected on daily runs, that running is a bigger entity than just me, my friends and family, and my own community. You now see people all over the world meeting at races short and long, small and big, the Color Run or the Boston Marathon. You see people running for cancer, running for stroke, running for cures, running for themselves, running for their kids, just running, running, running all the time. And whatever motivations and reasons they have, they get to that starting line. They prove to themselves and the world (though not always believing they can get to the finish line) that they have the determination, passion and strength within themselves to cross it.
My relationship with running might not always be an easy one. I might not always love running, or running might not always love me. But I know that running will always be there, whether I choose to run or not, and that’s something that I will always love about it. I can only imagine becoming disabled or losing family members at an event that has so much spirit, courage, strength and love, only to end in a frightening and disheartening way.
I know the Boston Marathon will only get stronger and better because of what happened. I hope that everyone involved finds peace and strength to continue to have the spirit, courage, strength and love for themselves and the ones they love.
I read these inspirational words a few days leading up to my first half marathon. These are stories from runners who ran in the 2012 Boston Marathon. I hope you enjoy them and see why they run.
http://www.boston.com/sports/marathon/whyirun2012/#/story-1280
