Yesterday I completed a completely positive run. I don't think I have ever done an official half-marathon race - to cheap to pay. Yet, I felt I just needed to do an official race. I was glad to find London's Run so close and on a good weekend and for a good cause. A family in Queen Creek started the race 7 years ago to benefit their daughter fighting cancer and continued on through this year to help other families fighting cancer after loosing their little London. The course was all through Schnepf farm, a working farm and it was delightful! I got right in the perfect pocket of people. It was fun to have a sense of comraderie with people running even though I didn't talk to a soul, I was just happy to be galloping along in their energy wave too. The first 8 miles these wonderfully dedicated runners pulled me along with a smile at record pace for me average of 8min miles. It felt fantastic! I listened to general conference talks intermittent with a few pace setting songs. All along the course they had cute posters with pictures of the kids now fighting cancer and their motivational sayings. My favorite was "Chafe now, brag forever!" It really was motivating. I felt so grateful for my body that was carrying me forward with such vigor and vivacity. I was amazed by the muscles in my legs and the moved and pushed. The sense of awareness caused by just admitting that everything about my health was a gift made the run even better. There was a series of three posters right along a particularly sunny stretch of dirt road, aprox mile 4-6, that hit right with the song from U2 "It's a Beautiful Day" - my ulitmated motivation song - and I hit a new high. Right then we joined a bit of the path with the 10k runners and I surged with power. 'Look at me!' my ego said while my muscles agreed 'I've already run your whole race distance and I am cruising right past you! I'm strong and amazing' It was the perfect self-esteem boost. Although sounding pretty rude, I still felt like I could celebrate the people that I was passing. I knew they were on their own journey and that this race for them was just as big an effort as my race was - they were doing something extraordinary for themselves and succeeding!
Around mile nine the 10k-ers turned to the East and us half-marathoners ran forward a bit more before turning West. The wind disappeared and the heat of the sunny and beautiful morning disappeared. My legs began to moan and the 'mind-over-matter' debate began. I knew my body could do it and that I would. It was just a matter of how I continued this race - determined to the best or just getting through. I happened to be listening to a talk about sin right at the key moment of decision. Usually as I slow I know I need to skip the talks and get to some up-beat music to push the pace, but I was captivated by the message and it's relativity of the emotional struggles of sin and the physical struggles of the race at that point. Elder D. Todd Christofferson taught of the anti-Christs that preached prior to Christ's visit to the Americas. They taught the easy doctrine, no need to suffer and no need to worry about sin. It requires no work when you do not have any accountability. Elder Christofferson related that "as in the days of Nehor and Korihor, we live in a time not long before the advent of Jesus Christ - in our case, the time of preparation for His Second Coming." At that moment I turned off the runners dialogue in my head and just listened to what he said. He told of how people don't like to hear about things that are difficult. We don't like facing the pain of sin or admitting we are not doing our best. "Pretending there is no sin does not lessen its burden and pain. Suffering for sin does not by itself change anything for the better." Those two words PAIN and SUFFERING struck a gong inside me. I felt pain and was certain I was suffering without reason. "Only repentance leads to the sunlit uplands of a better life." I looked around me as the sun glinted gracefully off the just harvested cotton fields. Everything around me was looking wonderful. I was on a stretch of silent road that lent itself to wonderful reflection and I was there, in that moment, learning through my physical experience what God had told a prophet to teach me. "Repentance is a divine gift, and there should be a smile on our faces when we speak of it. See, I am smiling." Of course I didn't 'see' Elder Christofferson smiling, but I felt it. I likewise felt that same smile coming alive inside me. I could smile in my hard lessons of life. I could smile while learning. And I by-gone, I could smile while getting through this one little hard mile and finish my best race ever. Carried through by the optimism of a story recounted by a member of the fated Donner party who forgot all the suffering of the long winter in the Sierra Mountains, and that was certainly worse than nine miles of voluntary running, I looked forward to the upcoming course.
Just as Elder Christofferson's talk finished, I literally turned a corner. With the adjustment to the south I caught a cross breeze. With each cooling breeze moving into mile 10 I breathed out gratitude again and had a spring in my step once more. My pace got back on track and by mile 12 I realized that even with lost time in mile 9 I could make this race a personal record! Mile 12-13 was my personal triumph. Never before had I felt the power in really motivating myself with driving positive reassurance. "C'mon Button, you are doing this. Just a little pain more, and this isn't even that bad. Man you can pull it through." For the first time in a long time I was my own cheering section! Even though it was a fight just to find my pace from the first part of my race, I was doing it, I was fighting! That last .1 mile to the finish was glorious. I didn't need a soul to scream my name in encouragement, the muscles in my legs gave me all the lift and support I needed and we glided over that finish line faster than I thought possible, catching that last rabbit right before the finish.
If we remember the contrasting feelings of dissapointment at the end of my last timed race (12ks of Christmas) to the end of this run, it would be gloriously different. I had given my body the liscence to show me the best of me and I had embraced it! I still feel happy. I knew that with two lost minutes I wouldn't get that medal for my age division - but heck! those amazing pace setters from the first part of the race deserved it! I had done awesome, and I was super satisfied. I ran over the line exactly on my adjusted (realistic adjustment made at mile 12 to still push me to the finish but not kill me) goal time, 1 hour 50 minutes. That averaged out my overall pace to 8:27 per mile. My overall goal was to keep each mile under a 9 minute pace, which I did minus one mile. Averaging that all out was soo coool! I came in 89th overall out of 409. Apparently this wonderful age bracket of 30-39 is the magical age for women to do the best cuz the top finishers were all my age. I got a few more years to work into this power status.
After the race we enjoyed letting the kids play in bounce houses and sitting in a helicopter and all the other fun things around the farm then came home together. I still had a full rest of the day with energy at rehearsals and a date to the temple with Josh. The Lord coordinated a beautiful day of learning and friendship for me. I felt like I could carry myself with more grace and positivity for lessons learned while running and living.
