How Running Saves the Human Race

I’m a runner. It’s one of the ways I define myself. I love to run. I suspect at the dawn of our species I had an ancestor who decided that running would be a better survival technique than strolling leisurely across the savannah. As the old Paleolithic saying goes:
“You don’t have to be faster than the leopard, you just have to be faster than the hairy guy next to you who would prefer to stroll.”

I’ve never found myself in a situation where I had to outrun a predator. Good thing, because I’m a decidedly average and non-competitive runner. I do not, however, jog. Anyone who would describe me as a “jogger” is either, A) a non runner who doesn’t know better, or B) an elite runner who needs to boost his own fragile ego by critiquing my admittedly slow pace. As long as he does it out of earshot, no harm done. Though, it might be better if he were eaten by a leopard. It’s good to stay humble, because you’re never the fastest runner on the savannah.

Staying humble is just one of the life lessons I’ve learned from running. Here are some others.
What doesn’t kill you makes you a better person. I love hills. Okay, maybe it’s more a love/hate thing, but hill climbs personify the running life, to persevere and overcome. There is a direct relationship between the level of pain endured and the sense of accomplishment in enduring it.

No amount of training and preparation can remove all variables. Some runs will be more difficult than others. Regardless of length and terrain, there will be runs of agony when ecstasy was expected. This will occur for no particular reason or with any advanced warning. Sometimes you get the leopard and sometimes the leopard gets you. Not to be taken literally.

Be proud of who you are. I don’t care how my running looks to others. I already know I’m not an elite athlete, so I’m not trying to impress anyone. But, hey, I’m the one out here, body and soul, on the shoulder of the road in faded and mismatched running togs. Running. What are you doing?

An important and meaningful life is built from small triumphs. Running is representative of a well lived life, personal and properly prioritized. I run because it makes me feel good about myself. My running goals are invisible to everyone else. There are no microphones or sportswriters waiting at the end of my runs. My reward is the satisfaction of accomplishment, taken together to provide some of the great achievements of a lifetime.

I’m a runner, and I will always be grateful for the legs, the heart and the will that allow me to run, because running has and will continue to improve my life. Average, I may be, but my distant forebears would be proud to know I’m still outdistancing the leopard.