Module 3b: Love
Learning to grieve and to suffer. | Module 3 - Endurance and Love | Somatic Essay
From Marathons to Mortality:
Behind every face of grief is an act of love. If I am to persist, I must love myself.
I’ve never experienced a “runner’s high.” I have, however, found practical validation of the medical literature that training endurance helps regulate anxiety. A key point here is that more intensity is more stimulation, is more stress. Your nervous system can’t tell the difference, hence the above points about “settling in” versus finding another rush to distract yourself.
Those anti-anxiety effects aren’t magic. They take work. Simply “thinking about running” isn’t the same. Stopping when you get uncomfortable, reinforces the limitation. By “settling in” you must accept the discomfort while not succumbing to it.
In the summer of 2021 I committed to really “learning” endurance through a 12-week program – not 30-days, not 60, not 9 weeks, a whole quarter of one year. Most of that was done in a pair of Merrell low cut boots, though utilizing the structures mentioned above (not my original creation).
As the capstone of that program I picked up a fresh pair of Altra running shoes from REI and pulled them right out of the box for a 2-hour trail run. No blisters (shout out to Altra for the extra-wide toe boxes!).
Like a lot of things worth doing, it wasn’t particularly fun in the moment, but I certainly didn’t regret the work once it was done.