Try to hang in there... I speak in parenthesis quite a bit. This one is long… I will try and shorten them later, but those of you who know me know that not talking is difficult for me to do.
When I was going into high school my parents forced me (thats how I viewed it) to get involved in some extracurricular activity. The options, after careful consideration (and the fact that I was yet to reach 5 feet tall and I might have been over 100 lbs if I was soaking wet and holding an anchor), came down to Cross Country (CC or XC or simply Cross) or Chorus. Well I couldnt sing to save my life, so I decided that if I were to be forced into anything I guess I will suffer through CC. The goal that first summer going into my 9th grade year was to run 100 miles over the 10 week summer (it could have been 11 weeks). A CC race for TN and maybe 2-3 other states is 3 miles all the other 46-47 state a high school CC race was 3.1 miles (5 kilometers). So that summer my dad ran with me most every run and I hated most every step. We ran 104 miles that summer... which was great for a 14 year old. Well, I ended up LOVING CC and I didnt have a problem running on my own after that. So I became obsessed. Was I talented or fast? No, but I loved it. In addition the coach (Ron Rubio) presented running as an analogy for life and as a deeply spiritual activity that we were able to participate in. My spiritual growth exploded during this time and it was wonderful. So by the time it was for me to graduate HS all I did was run and everything I did and talked about seemed to have something to do with running. It became my identity. I was a runner. That senior season, for most of it, I was the #1 runner on the CC team (says A LOT about the school... we had no one of real talent running that year).
I remember the day that CC ended for me. It was the first Saturday in November of 1999, we were running the Sate CC meet in Nashville, TN at Percy Warner State Park not too far from Whit Jordan's house (we actually ran in the same meet once or twice, talk to him about that he would remember) I can remember most of the race, but an aspect that sticks out to me was this: about a half mile left in the race (I had a terrible race and was beyond crushed at this point in time) I heard the patter of little feet behind me and I knew instantly who it was. It was an up-and-coming freshman who had actually beaten me in the second race of the year and almost beat me in another race. It was my little brother, BJ (or D-Luxx or James and compared to me he was little... that says something). He started encouraging me to dig and to push hard (in the middle of the race). I was ticked that I had such a bad last race so I turned to him and yelled at him "SHUT UP, you RUN... just SHUT UP and RUN" so he kicked it into overdrive and finished a good distance ahead of me. BJ went on to run some exceptional times later in his career. After CC was over I actually mourned for quite sometime because I had invested so much of myself into it… CC was my identity.
I continued running off and on and I still enjoyed it. During college I trained for 3 marathons and was able to run 2 of them. I would not really be consistent throughout the year, but ran more than I didn’t run... Until Oct of 2005, when BJ and I ran the Chicago Marathon together. Now is not the time to tell this amazing story, but I will say it was my most satisfying and inspiring event in my life to date. To prepare for that amazing experience I put together and executed my best running program of my life. Chicago was truly a mountain top experience. Over the next several months, and because of an extraordinarily unfortunate event that happened earlier in the year (also not the time or place to talk about), I felt depressed. I didn’t have any motivation to run. It didn’t concern me at first, I just figured I needed to rest and recover. By the time summer rolled around (usually my time to start running again if I had gotten out of the habit because of disc and finals etc…) I still didn’t want to run. That continued the whole next year. I just didn’t feel like running. For the first time in my life I didn’t want to run. I tried to find other clothes to wear besides my running shirts… but since I didn’t have anything else to wear I opted to feel uncomfortable and hypocritical and wore them anyway. I asked and helped pay for a sweet running GPS/HR monitor (Garmin Forerunner 305) for Christmas hoping that would help alleviate my running depression (yeah, I helped pay for my own Xmas present), it didn’t. Heather and I ran some before school was out in the spring, but that didn’t stay during the summer. I wanted the desire to run again, badly.
Now the haunting question: Who am I? Am I a runner… I couldn’t call myself one. Since the fall of 1996 I was calling myself a runner and very proud of it. In fact, there was a guy one time (right after I graduated HS that was on my CC team) who said to my face: “you are not a runner.” There are two things that he will never do again: walk and eat solid food. Not really, but man I wanted to liquefy his spine. So now I am faced with a delima… where does my identity lie? I think that question is profound. Where do we place the weight of where we find meaning for ourselves? How do we measure ourselves? Is it in something or someone that can and will change depending on environment or circumstances? If that is the case than we are assured disappointment, bitterness, the overwhelming feelings of emptiness, and the feeling that all of our efforts are in vein. I have yet to experience something worse than giving my best and failing miserably (from a personal standpoint).
Of course I have an opinion on the matter. I don’t think the concept that I am about to present all that difficult or mind blowing or complex… it not even CLOSE to original, but man its nice for me to think about. I believe the more we understand our LORD better we place our identity in HIM. Wow, the GOD of the Cosmos, The Great I AM, The KING, The SAVIOR of the World, rescued me because HE delights in me (Psalm 18:19)… that’s crazy awesome. There is nothing that I can say or do that can deserve that Truth.
Its been three weeks since I have been here… I have run 9 times (and have only missed one run). That might not sound like much, but let me assure you that it is a VAST improvement over my previous (almost) 2 years. I am seeing improvements and enjoying what I am doing and more importantly I am excited about this future of running.
7 comments:
This is your Mom....your proud Mom. I cried as I read this latest blog. Wish I had known your were hurting so I could hurt with you. It's amazing the things a parent finds out about their children much later in life... You put on a good front...we didn't know you were depressed and not wanting to run. Glad you are "finding" your identity and am proud to know to Whom you are identifying with.
Thanks mom, I probably should have clarified... I was not "clinically" depressed... just not motivated. I was happy, but I sure didnt work very hard in really anything. sorry to make you sad!
what up bland! good to see you got this going so we can keep up with you. quite the story my friend, and glad to know that you're feeling that drive again.
Hi Justin, Keri (formerly Estes) here. I really enjoyed your most recent blog about running. It touches on a lot of things I can relate to and tend to think about. As a swimmer, runner and nordic skier in high school, I can certainly identify with the "morphing" into sports being one's identity. I think especially in high school, this is the predecessor to something Claire Davidson recently blogged about regarding work and identity. Our whole lives we are asked the question, "so what do you want to be when you grow up?" As if what you do everyday is what you are. High school activities seem to be where we can try on different hats of "who we are" defined by what we do. But then an interesting thing happens to a large percentage of very dedicated high school athletes. They are no longer athletes in college. I certainly do not have a runners body type, nor do I have a swimmer or nordic skiers body type for that matter. Any success I had in high school was fought for tooth and nail. College sports definitely weren't on my radar in a serious way. So I went from being voted "Future Olympian" in my high school year book to...nothing... Sure, I tried to run in college. But between my new found identity crisis (moving to doing it because it defined me to doing it because I really wanted to) and an onset of rheumatoid arthritis I really struggled with maintaining motivation. In the years since college, I have run three half-marathons which have been cathartic for me in moving to running for personal health reasons not out of a need to figure out who I am or to define myself. I think as Christians, it is important as you wrote, to define ourselves in and by our relationship with Christ. But I also think it is natural, given our culture, to at least in some way, define ourselves by what we do. And while you’re right about the disappointment and other frustrating feelings that can come when we solely define ourselves by our actions, it can think of no better spiritual metaphor than that of “leaving the old self behind.” It was hard for me to make a transition from super-athlete woman to regular Keri who tries her best to workout three times per week. But, I think it is a lesson that is imperative spiritually and emotionally. The things we once did can not and will not define us forever (except for those relating to the spiritual realm). I will take lessons that I learned from running and use them likely in all areas of my life. I’m thankful for the experiences God gave me which have led me to this point: My name is Keri, and I am not a runner. :o)
How I recall so many of those same sensations in my quirky XC career. When I discovered that I was "not a runner," I was really down for some time, until I realized that my value no longer depended upon the activity. If I were "a runner," I would be under mountains of pressure to perform well. In my case, if I ran well, good deal; if not, eh, whatever, at least I'm getting in better shape than the day before.
Good post…I thought I saw what you were getting at and completely agree.
There was definitely a good amount of college where I defined myself as an ultimate player—if not out loud, certainly by my actions and priorities.
The pull of the world is very strong…in a lot of areas.
Kari,
Wow, Great to hear from you! I hope you are well. Thanks for contributing, I appreciate your words.
I agree that it is natural for us to define ourselves by what we do... I think we need to be careful though (and thats what i am hearing you say as well).
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