Cutting it short
Today I was struck by the most feared enemy of the long-distance runner…INTESTINAL DISTRESS! No seriously, yes I giggle like a 12 year-old when it comes to poop, but it was bad today. I had everything go well before the run. Woke up, had breakfast, went to the bathroom, like clockwork. Everything felt good, and all was running smoothly, and about mid-way through it just hit. I had to walk most of the last two miles, out of fear. Yes, THAT fear! I even cut the run half a mile short of where I wanted to be for the day. It’s another holiday weekend here and I don’t want to spend all my time running.
It is late here, I had much to do after the run today, so I left this until tonight. After the run, I did what the intestinal distress demanded I do. Then showered, shaved, and ran off to get my hairs cut. Yes, I get more than one cut! By then it was a matter of throwing lunch together and getting out the door for work. Worked, stopped at the store on the way to the train, watched a very boring Manchester Derby while I made dinner, and now I have a minute.
But listen, the whole intestinal distress thing, it’s funny but it’s no joke. Be careful out there if things are off, you can do damage to yourself. You can cause an injury if you try to run faster than you should due to circumstances. There’s always a lot that can happen on a run. So always listen to your body during training. PRs are for races, for controlled conditions, the world of training is (for non-elite athletes) a (no pun intended) crap-shoot. Just do what you can, and if you can’t perform that day, so be it. Make the miles count, don’t just count the miles! What I did was try to make the last however long into a tempo run. As fast as I could run for as far as I could run basically. It didn’t work great, but it worked a little.
So just do what you can, it doesn’t have to be something overly heroic. We’re not out competing for market share, endorsement deals or any of that nonsense. We’re out to make ourselves healthier, and to be better than we were the day before. I’ve touched on that a million times. It’s all about being better than you were yesterday. Whether we’re talking running, or in life. The only person we should ever be in competition with is ourselves. This is the problem with almost the entire world. Everyone is looking to beat the person next to them, and it trips everyone up. It slows everyone down and it kills us. Literally, given we are in the 6th major extinction event, this may kill us all. The only person you should every try to beat, is the person you were yesterday. Any other view of the world turns into domination, which turns into oppression, and then whomever ends up “in control” (which there is no control) positions the rules to perpetuate the oppression ad infinitum.
Look to yourself, control yourself. That’s it. That’s all there is. The rest of the world is as it is. The appearance of human “control” over any of this is a matter of illusion and causes us to hurt each other. You can only control yourself, and your reactions to things. We try and control nature, and we make species go extinct. We try and control our made up idea of wealth and we oppress others with racism, sexism, and all manner of bigotry. The only thing any person can ever hope to be a master of is themselves. That is the only wealth worth owning, being in control of yourself, being in control of your own life. Even if you attain that ideal, there is no extending outward from there. Yes, there are wrong actions in this world which require extreme reactions from all of us. Sometimes we must instruct others in ways which make the message very clear that their action was unacceptable. But we still have no control over them in the end. We can only hope we instruct them to improve themselves, and cease the action which is unacceptable.
It may be possible to remove that person completely from society. But I think that should be a rare instance. It’s very difficult to get through to so many, but once the ideas of modern wealth are destroyed, I think it will become easier. Once an understanding is in place, that this system was set up by one particular class of people, from one particular geographic location, and was set up to only serve them, and participation in that system will always yield the same results, to the benefit of the same people, I think it will become easier to instruct all but the most stubborn of those among us. At which point, removing them from participation in a just and equal society will become a simple matter.
Maybe I watched too much Star Trek as a kid. But I really believe all this. There are already so many out there who already understand this, and unfortunately they are mostly the ones who are designed to be the outsiders in the current system. They are ignored and dismissed by so many people who buy into the current insanity of the world. So many who participate in a system designed to keep them down, yet also designed to keep the people who already understand the underlying truth as scapegoats. As targets for the pawns. To keep the workers distracted and divided, so they don’t ever question the dominance of the rulers.
Anyway, I have to head to bed, have lots of miles to put in tomorrow! Hope this makes enough sense tonight, and gets you a little uncomfortable, and maybe helps you think about how you can improve. Some of you reading, don’t have to improve, some of you are of that outsider caste, and I’m sorry for that.
Have fun, keep running, and remember; if Gil can run then so can you!
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