let up & let down

it should be easy to tell you about what happened on my run on friday, but the truth is i've written three complete posts and pitched them all out. too wordy. trying to connect the dots and spell e v e r y t h i n g out for you to understand. but what i experienced was, at the heart of it, very simple.

it started about 2 miles in the run: this realization that i'm fighting against my lack of endurance and how it makes my runs less fun and me more judgmental. but i quickly realized that i just need to suck it up and run because that's the only way i'm going to get to the other side. additionally {i told myself}, the place i am at physically right now doesn't negate the strength i was so joyfully celebrating last month. and while it's also been a bumpy ride emotionally this month, it's not something that threatens the resilience and courage i've been celebrating in myself recently. this is just a month out of my life and a stepping stone in the right direction, no matter how uncomfortable it is at the time.

but about a mile or so later, i felt my heart open up to accept this truth that the mind had claimed. embrace it with welcoming arms and a tender spirit: i am here. right now. in this place of both physical and emotional rebuilding. and this past month, on both levels, has been exposing raw nerves and inflamed ligaments. rehabilitating these lingering injuries of the body and spirit. and in the length of a city block, the heart felt for these things, but also brought along a feeling of hope for the future that this work is helping me prepare for.

so in this moment, i could accept this month as just a piece of the puzzle and a necessary phase to get where i want to go.

but it didn't stop there.

a mile or two later, running along the backside of a cemetery, the song let down {yes, radiohead} came up on shuffle. the first half of the song, with true radiohead spirit, so beautifully acknowledged the disappointments of life: being crushed to the ground and let down as only thom can sing about. but as the final verse crescendoed through my earphones, it delivered with it an image i couldn't close my eyes against. i saw, in sync with the rush of sound and energy of the music, two iridescent waves curling toward each other in front of me, colliding, and flowing quickly toward me in their warm, golden glory. and suddenly, my body had this expansive sense of not only running in this finite moment of time, but also on the greater path of my life, forward toward my future that was rushing enthusiastically to meet me. and what an exciting future those waves seemed to represent.

i had to close my eyes it was almost too much. overwhelming and beautiful as only sudden truths can be.

and sitting here, writing about it, my heart breaks for moments like these when i feel far away from where i want to go, disappointed and disconnected from things that are important to me. afraid of them even. afraid of doing the wrong thing. saying the wrong thing. asking too much. not asking enough. what if what i envision for myself is too beautiful to happen in this world? there are days when i feel powerless. powerless because i'm not sure if i will ever hear back, because i miscalculated taxes and owe over $1,000 that i would rather spend on other things, and powerless because i'm still to scared to even prepare for an audition.

and yet, it's there. these moments of acceptance like the one from my run. tangible enough to be accessible whenever i sit in my inner stillness and relive the moment or replay the song and hear him travel through his own doubts to find his way to sing so appropriately to me:

you know, you know where you are with

you know where you are with

floor collapsing, falling, bouncing back

and one day, i am gonna grow wings

a chemical reaction {you know where you are}...

so, for tonight, tomorrow and the next day and countless after, it's just important for me to keep putting one step in front of the other, one recovery run after the other, one disappointment after the next, however many it takes for me to get where i am going. because i do know where i am. i know it. i know it. i know it. and one day, i am going to grow wings.

..........................................................................................

here is the song let down. the verse i was referring to starts at 3:40