(by Mary Oliver)
Today I'm flying low and I'm
not saying a word.
I'm letting all of the voodoos of ambition
sleep.
The world goes on as it must,
the bees in the garden rumbling a little,
the fish leaping, the gnats getting eaten.
And so forth.
But I'm taking the day off.
Quiet as a feather.
I hardly move though I'm really traveling
a terrific distance.
Stillness.
One of the doors
into the temple.
 |
| Not saying a word. |
On Halloween I found my alter ego begging me to go past the domain of my coach's training plan. I ran a sub 8 min paced 10 miler with Shelly and immediately drove to meet my friend Ted for a 30 mile bike ride with much of it into a headwind. I had only eaten a banana for breakfast and the last 10 miles on the bike were tough, as a perfectly predictable bonk ensued. I found myself seething with disappointment in myself. Pathetic. A shadow of your former ironman self. Kick the dirt, spit on it, negativity eating me alive.
On Saturday I worked for a friend who wanted to go camping with his son. I watched my older daughter scrimmage a volleyball team from Williamsburg. I drove my daughter to two birthday parties. I didn't run, bike, or swim a meter. I monitored the results of the New York City Marathon. One of the participants was a man from Louisiana named Josh Lajaunie who I learned about on the Rich Roll podcast. He weighed over 400 lbs, and dropped to less than 200 lbs on a plant based diet and the newly found love of running. Such an inspiration… one of my favorite and most memorable podcasts.
Well darned if one of my No Meat Athlete running group buddies knows Josh, and connected me with him on Facebook and Strava. We shared some encouraging words over the phone after my 10K 2 weeks ago, and I was thrilled to see his updates through the race, and see his amazing finish in less than 4 hours.
Sunday morning the temperatures dropped to the low 40's, the winds gusted up to 35 mph, and the cold rain fell sideways. I had planned to meet my coach and the rest of the group for a long run… there was even the suggestion that my coach would pace me. But no one else showed. The weather was nightmarish. But I had some angry determination and ran into that headwind all by myself. After a few miles I wasn't cold, and the rain didn't bother me anymore. I kept my pace more conservative and kept running until I had to stop to attend a soccer game. 12 miles. And to my surprise it didn't feel like anything.
And last night as I was getting grumpy because my coach hadn't touched base with me. No plan in place for the next 4 weeks. And then…
I just took a deep breath.
Be quiet.
Let the voodoos of ambition sleep.
I took a rest day today.
And I keep letting go little by little.
People dropping half their weight, no matter what they eat, is incredible. What a great story and how cool that you were able to connect and talk with Josh!
ReplyDeleteI hear ya on the "day off" stuff....took one myself!