The Human Race
By: R Dean Yoakum
Solykos Media©
7/4/2019
The time is four a.m. on a crisp autumn morning and I stand on my back porch while I watch my dog do her business and envy her blissful ignorance. I take a deep breath and survey the skies, as the fog surrounds the air and the conifer trees sway in the wind against a clear moonlit backdrop. What has me up at this ungodly hour you ask? Well, it’s finally the day I am set to run that damn 50k I’ve been training for these past six months.
My health had been getting put on the back burner as the stresses of life begin to pile up on me. Honestly, I signed up so that I would have a reason to say no to the 3 plus donuts I have been eating every morning while gossiping around the watering hole at the office. I have run my fair share of marathons and figured it would be an easy goal, although the first couple months of training have proven that theory to be incorrect.
Once the fur child has finished answering nature’s call, I get a pot of coffee brewing to give my central nervous system a kick start before I begrudgingly begin to load my gear into the Jeep. As I finish loading the pot signals to me that liquid gold from the gods has finished and is ready for my taste buds to indulge. While I slowly sip my sweet sepia espresso the taste and aroma recruit the action in me to start getting suited up for my race.
As I tighten up my laces, I begin to run the race in my mind’s eye, thinking about, planning for and preparing for everything that could go wrong along the way. Do I have enough water bottles to keep me plenty hydrated between checkpoints? Are my pace keepers going to show up and be at 100%? Have I eaten enough this morning and do I have enough fuel on me to keep me energized before I reach the first aid station? And the worst scenarios, well I will leave those to your imaginations. Going down my mental checklist I begin to feel the butterflies start to take flight in my stomach.
I have never attempted to compete in a run of this distance before. Sure, I have run my fair share of marathons, however, none of those ever presented a challenge of this magnitude. Not even my first marathon, I was much younger and way more resilient back then. Besides, it’s been 5 years since I have completed my last one. Not to mention I had treated them much more like social events, something I just did for fun, shits and giggles as they would say. Never was it a “challenge” to complete one, to the point that we would always end at the pub afterward. Drowning our victories with beer and greasy pub food. Reminiscing on these days past does nothing to tame the butterflies and they begin to flurry just a bit faster as I finish loading my gear up.
Sitting there, before I start the Jeep to head out, I take three slow controlled breaths.
Sitting there, before I start the Jeep to head out, I take three slow controlled breaths. Then remind myself why I am signed up for this. I turn the key, pull out of the driveway and set out on my journey to push myself beyond my limits. It’s a long enough drive into the mountains to give you plenty of space for my thoughts. The anxiety of preparation begins to creep back in, as I run through my mental checklist more times than I can keep track of.
As I approach my destination, I feel the butterflies start to take off in full force. Once I find a space to park, I survey the check-in stations and begin to take in all the hustle and bustle of my opponents as they prepare themselves for the race. They scurry about all frantically as they check-in, get the gear lined up and routes planned out. I can quickly tell the difference between the prepared and unprepared. What does that make me? I contemplate this as I approach the check-in station for my section of the alphabet.
By now the sun begins its ascent and cutting through the trees disbursing the heavily set autumn mist from the air. I can smell the dawn breaking as I get checked in, which makes those butterflies start to settle into a formation. The volunteer hands me my number with a foldable map of the course and I find a table to sit down at to finish getting myself prepared. Pulling out my thermos of coffee, I pour some into the lid to sip on as I plan my aid station stops, pace and timing between them.
I had given myself what, at the time, I thought was an unrealistic goal of 7 hours 15 minutes. Although during training these past six months I have learned that hitting the whole 31.06 miles in that time was certainly feasible. That is if I approached the training part correctly. Which ultimately my health was the motivation, so even if I don’t actually run the race at all, I have already won in that arena. I had mentioned before that I signed up for this because I could feel my health starting for the first time to take a turn in the wrong direction. Sitting here this morning, taking in all the runners darting about getting ready to run the entire thirty-one plus miles we all have committed to run today, I finally grasp that. This realization helps me to get those butterflies I have been so nervous about all day to fly in a controlled formation.
Confidence sinks in.
Finishing up my final task to get ready for the race, I fold up my map and pack my thermos back up. I have two hours to spare. Finally taking a glance at my phone, I notice that my pacers have sent me their confirmation that they are ready and on their way. By the gifs and memes being exchanged in the group text I can tell everyone is in good spirits. Gets a few chuckles out of me as I think about how I am going to spend this extra time I have given myself for being prepared early. I could stretch? Naw. Already did that and I don’t need to overdo it. Go over my route one time? But I just finished that and how will it help anyway? I could grab a bite to eat and get more fuel in me, but I feel good enough already and don’t need to fill my stomach up.
Shit, those butterflies are starting to do their own thing again. I thought I had them under control? Now I am running through the checklist of everything that could go wrong again. This time, however, a quiet voice of reason quickly speaks up from the dark corners of my mind. “Look at all your fellow racers.” It says, “They are all still getting ‘prepared’ for this, they are not ready.”
I start to survey the field of runners getting ready again.
“You were ready for this two weeks ago!” it reminds me, “You’ve even had your bags packed for two days now!”
So I ask myself, “What I am really so nervous about?” With no valid response, I then tell myself that I have done all that is in my control to get ready for this and the rest is up to the fickle mistress that is Fate.
With that in mind, I get up and grab another cup of liquid gold and glue a grin of confidence to my face that tells my competitors that I am ready for anything. Equipped with all of that I walk off into the crowds of runners as they all rush around inside their own individual anxiety suits.
Now the whole point of this analogy is to point out an observation of mine. I’ll argue that running the race represents our life, or life’s path, and the different races become the phases we go through. In other words, each time we complete a race is like moving from childhood to adolescence and then into becoming an adult and so on. Each race comes with its own lesson it is trying to teach us, and you cannot move to the next race until you learn the ins and outs of the previous race. The course, or how you chose to run the course, can be likened to your journey as you age through the years. Now keep in mind there can be multiple courses per race, as each course will build upon the last one. In turn, you cannot start one race without completing the one before it and will repeat the race until you learn why you are running it. The competitors then, become the challenges that life presents you with on your journey, along with the “unknowns” or the quick turns, sharp cliffs, fallen rocks, tree stumps, mud and even the weather.
For the purpose of this thought experiment, let’s pretend that every one of us has been given a race to run and we have to complete it no matter what. The question that comes to mind is, “What do we get out of running our race?” Or is that the wrong question? I will like to point out that the outcome of your race is determined mainly by what you, yourself put into the race. In turn, putting little to no effort into staying ready for anything that could approach us in this race, and focusing only on what we do not have control of, leaves us open for setback and mishaps. Which ultimately just opens us up for more setbacks by giving them the space they need to build on each other. All the while giving us an illusion of a gigantic wall to climb if we ever want to see an end to this race that is like the portrait we had painted for ourselves when we were young whippersnappers. Just like when you first sign up for that race you’ve been speculating upon with your co-workers, before your optimistic dreams from childhood had a little bit of “real world” sprinkling on top of them, you would approach the races with a lot more enthusiasms. A lot less complaining about the setbacks (or competitors in your way) that you face on the daily because, for myself at least, I didn’t view them as competitors in my youth.
Let us not forget that these competitors in your “way” are not here to just make things more difficult. They act as a guide of sorts, coupled them with the “unknowns” and you can think of them as your life’s compass. Only they don’t simply point the way to you. They are more like a slight nudge in the right direction. So instead of trying to blow past one of these challenges, it’s best to take a second to step back and observes them, until the time is right to pass with ease. If you just speed past the other runners, you could miss a valuable opportunity to learn if there might be a better way to approach the “unknowns” that the course has around each corner. When you take a second to slow down you can obtain some valuable insight by watching how your competitors are approaching the obstacles that you are about to have to face. When you just blow past them it is comparable to taking your own ego to serious and you begin to become over-confident.
That will ultimately set you up for, at the most complete failure, and at least a major setback. Let us not forget that you have no choice but to keep running this race because your other option is to cease to exist altogether. While that will definitely get rid of the problems you have created for yourself, it will also get rid of you and any impact you can have on improving the race for everyone that has to come behind you. Which, I argue, is one thing that separates the Human Race from every other race on this Pale Blue Dot we are blessed to call home. Furthermore, it is how you will master one course so that you can move onto the other. As we are all running this race, and the ones that change the course to benefit all that come after, are the ones that become immortal. They get talked about for ages, the scribes tell stories of their achievements and the monuments that get erected to remind us that we are ALL capable of such greatness.
However, even with the improvements of the past competitors, we must still run the race ourselves, and everyone’s race will be different. The “Greats” that came before us, merely point the way to a simpler journey to the completion of each course. Which is necessary so we can move onto the next one. In other words, they help us learn the lesson that each trial and tribulation is trying to teach us to not have to repeat them again and again. As you ultimately will feel like you are running in circles every time you ignore the lessons being taught and arrogantly keep pushing through thinking that you can do everything on your own. Which is kind of a form of dialetheia, isn’t it? Where it is true that you have to run this race alone, it is, however, also false. It is false for the reason that separates the Human Race from every other race on this Pale Blue Dot, that I mentioned before. We possess the greatest tool for any species to possess, communication. Which the great apes that came before us have given us this tool. For us to be able to share our experiences with the “competitors” that are running alongside us, and the ones that will run their journey after ours is complete. With this, if we can slow our ego down enough to study what they have passed down to us about the lessons they had to learn to make their journey more enjoyable to run. Then we can see how we can apply them to our own unique journey and not have to repeat the same mistake they did to get past the “unknowns” or the quick turns, sharp cliffs, fallen rocks, tree stumps, and deeper than expected mud puddles.
Now, while most of those challenges you will face are static and can be prepared for; the ones that are not, like the weather on race day, or the mud puddles it leaves behind. Even the fellow racer that has a different goal or is just there to get in your way. These are obstacles that cannot be anticipated. So, even if we take the lesson we have had to learn from our own experiences and pair them with the teachings from the past runners. We can still be as prepared as possible for every static challenge we can think of and still end up repeating the course again and again. As you cannot anticipate every challenge. So, instead of trying to do so, or even trying to avoid them altogether. You can focus your energy on being ready for anything, and simply accepting what is happening on your journey that is not inside your realm of control. That, my friends, is how you will sit back and run your race to its full enjoyment. Just be prepared and accept what you cannot change, then keep running with a smile on your face and try and do it better than the ones that came before you. So, you can change the course of the Human Race ever so slightly to make it more enjoyable for the runner that will come after you.
