Stupid Honest. RRR T-5 days

“I lift up my eyes to the mountains—where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of Heaven and earth.” Psalm 121:1-2

Run Rabbit Run 50 is just days away. My nerves are on tilt even knowing I have everything covered. I have trained my little heart out for the last 8 months. 

But I am still a wreck. I am scared. And I am stupid honest. I have had 3 melt downs in 10 days. That ugly place where you lose your breath, where your insides are cramping, and I feel like I am going to puke. At one point I couldn't find some flight info and at another point I couldn't find my registration. Both times I thought the room was closing in on me, massive panic and tears were about to erupt. I was in full on emotional breakdown. 
BREATHE. CHILL OUT. 
I asked Andy last week to be HONEST with me and share my STRENGTHS and WEAKNESSES going into the race. I needed to know.

STRENGTHS:  Experience, mental fortitude, solid training....
WEAKNESSES: The Elevation, the Altitude

I thought about Andys honesty and before giving more space to fear my heart actually settled. I have one strength Andy forgot to mention. 
One strength that covers all. 
I have one strength that has power to not only run the mountains but MOVE the MOUNTAINS!!

2 Corinthians 12:9 He said, "My Grace is all you need. My power works best in WEAKNESS.: So now I am glad to boast about my weakness, s that the power of Christ can work through me. 

I know my weaknesses. I know my strengths; I have gotten very familiar with them. But if the Lord leads me into weakness, it teaches me to depend on Him. I can see those mountains ahead of me. The mountains that represent what I have already conquered. One step at a time. One mile at a time. I can see the mountain, but I want to experience the invisible. Faith to make it over them when my strength is gone. Faith to run when I am weak, when I am tired when I am at my weakest. 

I am stepping out in fear and in faith. That fear is what makes me tremble in self. But that FAITH is what conquers mountains! SO I am taking that leap of faith in full reliance on the one who created the mountains to carry me over them in victory! 

BIG SHOUT OUT to JAZZ and JOEL. Andy and I went camping over the weekend. We went to support our friends trying to qualify for Boston. Congrats to Jazz for qualifying and Joel for a PR of over 20 minutes!! Also Kathy M and Christina for also qualifying! Watching the grit of these athletes truly inspired me!!

OUR Crew: Will, Donny, Joel, Jazz, Erica, me and Andy!

In Peace not Pieces, 
Anita

"Whoops...Whoops..."

 

Today, I worked half the day on what many people would get done in minutes. Numbers are not my thing. Even today on my run with Christina and Lynn we all found ourselves laughing at how our significant others enjoy numbers, but it is a place of torture for us. 

I have been following Hal Koerners training plan for 50 miles, his plans I have followed since running Cloudsplitter in 2015. 

For Christmas Andy gifted me this book with a registration to Cloudsplitter 100k. 

This afternoon, I got out my pens, my highlighters, my old school running journal and began calculating and making my own little grid to add to Hals. I wanted to see how far off I was from his plan. 

When I got all done calculating my miles and double checking with my Strava I was very satisfied with my training for Run Rabbit Run in 2 weeks.  

Pleased and proud of all my work I showed Andy. I handed him what I had been working on and stood back waiting for him to smile in approval and even praise me for my nerdy work! 

And I waited...

And shivering with excitement I watched him intensely....

AND THEN...a smirk and a eyebrow raise...I smiled bigger and thought, "He thinks I am so cool"! 

Andy studied it, realizing what I had been working on, he says, "hmm, WHOOPS, whoops...whoops..."

I giggled because the graph I gave him was 16 total weekly miles of Hal Koerner, then I added a column that showed my miles for that week. 

I may have overshot a few weeks by a few miles BUT I didn't have very many weeks I was under milage. And even my under milage weeks were only missed by a few miles. Those were usually recovery weeks from my overage. 

Over the course of the last 16 weeks of training I have had several "WHOOPS". 

16 weeks of training for me has had its fair share of mishaps, misdirection's and even misjudgments. 

I ran many miles with friends, and I ran many miles solo. 

I ran happy, I ran sad, I ran angry, and I ran miles where I felt all those emotions in one run. 

But one thing always remained, I RAN GRATEFUL. 

AFRAID: Fragments of my mind. 

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.” 2 Timothy 1:7

I had to overcome some weakness I have. I had to face my fears and challenge myself to train them away. 

I chose Run Rabbit Run because it frightened me. 

I was afraid of the elevation. 

I was afraid of the terrain. 

I was afraid of the lack of oxygen in the air. 

I was afraid of the training. 

I was even afraid of my age and if my body would be strong enough to train my weaknesses. 

But you become unstoppable when you conquer your weaknesses, your fears or anything that people cannot take away from you. 

Your mindset, your character, your entire being. I can train my body to run all day long but if my mindset is not healthy my body will not overcome my fears, my insecurities, even my failures. 

My fears didn't dissolve, they just no longer manage me! 

Being Unstoppable.

Run with your legs to be fast. Run with your mind to be faster. Run with your heart to be unstoppable. - Aalaynah Thompson

My greatest challenge is when my mind is turbulent. I cannot trust myself. But when we learn to weaponize our fear we can deal with it and overcome it. 

Today, I was able to run with 2 fearless ladies! 

I was so excited to run with Christina and Lynn. These two ladies are more than just runners, they are incredible humans. We talked about some of our fears today with honestly and transparency. Sometimes it is scary to be so transparent, we bonded very quickly. 

They are overcomers, and unstoppable. 

Conclusion: 

"The Lord your God is in your mist, A mighty one who will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness. He will quiet you by His love.." Zeph 3:17

Whether it is fear or failures, or whatever the fragments of my mind are. No matter what the training plan is or how I missed the mark I am reminded that in my limited abilities I am directed by the Lords LIMITLESS grace and love for me. 

In Peace not Pieces, 

Anita