Bouncing Back: A Reflection on My Third Marathon

I ran my third marathon on Saturday. It was—just like the two before it—beautiful. 

My first was in New York City, nearly two years after I’d moved there as a 21-year-old. Running the world’s biggest marathon is a dream. I will never forget what it felt like to be surrounded by tens of thousands of runners as I completed my first 26.2. 

My second marathon was in Florida in December and I—foolish northerner—assumed that those two things cancelled each other out. When the sun rose about halfway through the race, I was not prepared for the temperature change. I think it might be the worst I’ve ever felt running. And yet when I crossed the finish line and hugged my family and friends, I knew it too would hold a special place for me.

Earlier this summer in my training, I had an amazing 16 mile run. It felt effortless. The kind of run they write poetry about. The next weekend, my long run was “only” 13.1 miles. “Oh, it’s just a half marathon this weekend; no big deal.” (Funny how marathon training completely skews your perception of distance.) In any case, that half marathon training run was awful. The kind of run they write eulogies for. 

After the bad run, I remember thinking that, while of course I’d rather have easy, beautiful runs, it’s probably good to mix in a few bad ones too. It’s a good reminder, evidence really, that I can push through tricky runs and that I can do hard things.

Both runs are training my legs. But one is doing a much better job at training my mind.

In the first mile of my third marathon, I was beside two women who were chatting to each other. It was early on in the race and the group of 5,000 or so runners was still a bit tight. I heard one woman say to the other, “I mean look at it. All of these people. They all came here to do this thing and they all have their own journey and story and...” 

We were separated before I could hear her friend’s response but her out loud thought was enough to wrack me with emotion. She’s right. How incredibly cool to look around and connect to a group of strangers all of whom came to this place to run for hours and call themselves marathoners. How many miles must each of them run in quiet mornings, on rainy afternoons, on treadmills at night? How many times did they move around childcare or leave the party early or build their training around their work schedules? How many sacrifices and sore muscles and doubt did each person on this road have to work through to end up here.

As the race progressed and everything seemed to fall into place, suddenly all those sweltering summer runs made sense. I felt, fairly early on, that I was going to set a personal record. Of course anything can happen over 26.2 miles but I was feeling incredible and I let that joy carry me.

Because you see, I loved my first marathon. It was like that 16 mile training run earlier this year. It just felt fun. And then my second marathon was like that shorter training run where I felt disconnected from my body entirely. But honestly thank goodness for both. For the good races that remind you how much you love the sport. For the bad ones that teach you how much you can endure. 

I hit the wall around mile 24. But a marathon is really just an extended mental game. And as I visualized the last 2 miles, I knew it was mental strength I needed to rely on more than muscle. And as I was talking myself through the motions of movement, I thought, “if this stage of the marathon is all mental, then I’m going to be just fine. Because I am so mentally strong.”

… Which kind of melted my brain for a moment. I’ve made conscious efforts over the years to improve my mental self talk but I wasn’t expecting my inner voice to hit me with that unexpected affirmation. But as I dug deeper, I realized I was right. It was a mental game. And I was going to be just fine. Because mentally, I have worked so hard for this. 

Every bad run. Every terrible experience. Every time I wanted to stop something but kept pushing through. Heck, every morning I microdose resilience with a two minute plank and when I look at my stop watch and see 20 seconds left and feel shaky but keep going, am I not setting myself up for greatness? By refusing to quit in every small moment, am I not showing myself that I can win in the big moments?

Before each race, I write on my fingers, “savor every mile,” an ode to an old colleague who gave me that advice before I ran New York. Years before that, another old colleague gave me a small stone with the word POWER on it that I never keep far from me. That was tucked into my pocket. A friend made me a friendship bracelet with the words “Living the Dream” on it. My left wrist. Still around my neck, an orange yarn, blessed and given to me by a monk in a dzong in Bhutan last month.

There are endless ways we can flex our minds. And there are endless ways we can give ourselves a soft place to land. If ever my mind started to waver, I only had to run my hand along the stone shaped bump in my pocket to remind myself who I was.

Racing or not, every morning for the past few months of training, I’ve woken up with a choice: do I show up for myself? Do I show up for myself when it’s cold or raining or hot? Do I show up for myself when I’m tired or busy or stressed? Do I keep showing up when the last run felt like such a disaster that I wonder if I can do it again?

Yes. Because hard miles count too. 

And.. because is not every mile a miracle? 

Is not every time you lace up your shoes an opportunity to improve? 

Let the miles strengthen your muscles, but let the practice strengthen your mind. And let us find peace in knowing that even our worst training runs are setting us up for greatness… if for no other reason than reminding us just how high we can bounce back after hitting the bottom.