Runners are
intelligent. Optimistically we think this, knowing for instance that
runners are the only species that wilfully damage themselves to the point
of bone fracture as in stress fracture. But overlooking this occasional lapse
of cerebral-acuity lets agree that runners are smart and by definition
this begets a little curiosity, a little questioning. Runners generally, are
searching … for something.
Contrary to
popular self-help schmaltz runners are not seeking space, nor peace, nor
quiet ... nor introspection nor reflection. Sure, these worthy benefits may
descend upon runners temporarily blessed with a “runners high”.
But even though we may not know this, runners are searching for something else.
In the
shallow waters of pop-psychology running is also an exploration, a pursuit of
limits, an embrace of boundaries, a discovery of vitality and exhaustion, of
purity and venom, of exuberance and anguish. Yes, running is all of these
things that bloggers and cheap health-literature eulogise. But this
is not all. More than all of these running is simply a search.
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| sandal running johanneburg natural zones - south africa |
Running is a
search for a touchstone, a point of reference. Runners are looking for something .... an anchor; something that may
even obviate the need for additional running.
When our
creativity evaporates and we struggle to communicate coherently and our efforts
feel futile and pointless, and we basically drop below par, we run. We look for renewal.
When feeling
distanced from communities and faced with vacuous social convention, we run.
The
tedium of repetitive anecdotes from dull unchanging people drain our enthusiasm
and drive us to run. When we need a break we run in search of spirit.
When friends
are mildly or strenuously tiresome and warm authentic conviviality disappears,
we run. (Sometimes we have to take care of ourselves first.)
When
families test our limits and challenge our sensibilities, when we need a
counterpoint to the noise of close blood we run to reclaim wholeness.
When we
question a god or anything close, perhaps unknowingly, and we nurture doubt
about issues we cannot fathom, we run in search of our soul.
As runners we
know that we don’t know. There are big questions, really big, for which we do
not manufacture or contrive a response, even though others might. This brutal
honesty is manifest in our chase. We search for absent endpoints, we hope for
certainty in pervasive doubt. We hunt an ephemeral truth. Runners move beyond
the comfort of knowing, we debate, question and search. We move closer to an
emptiness that others avoid or deny. And through this, our search itself becomes
an anchor, our running defines the absent goal.
We run in search of truth and
the run itself becomes that truth … even though we may not know this.
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| thanks to tallguysurfing.blogspot |
