Saturday Run

To begin, we should consider the following quote by David Fincher:

"We're designed to be hunters and we're in a society of shopping.  There's nothing to kill anymore, there's nothing to fight, nothing to overcome, nothing to explore." 

We are surrounded by people who have lost their sense of adventure.  We lead sedentary lives, locked in chains.  Robbed of our mobility, our flexibility and our mental soundness.  Our potentials and opportunities are lost to the most dangerous place in the word; the couch.  The consequences of our poor choices contaminate our bodies like plague filled veins.  I've had to watch the high school track and football star throw it all away.  To me the saddest part is that we all hold the keys but most of us never realize it.


 "We've taken away the jobs our bodies were meant to do, and we're paying for it.  Nearly every top killer in the Western world-heart disease, stroke, diabetes, depression, hypertension, and a dozen forms of cancer-was unknown to our ancestors.  They didn't have medicine, but they did have a magic bullet-or maybe two, judging by the number of digits Dr. Bramble was holding up.  "You could literally halt epidemics in their tracks with this one remedy," he said.  He flashed two fingers up in a peace sign, then slowly  rotated them downward till they were scissoring through space.  The running man.  "So simple," he said.  "Just move your legs.  Because if you don't think you were born to run, you're not only denying history.  You're denying who you are."  Born to Run, Christopher McDougall.

Just the other day I received an email from a friend that completely backed up this piece from Born to Run.  The email read:

"It was only a little over 6 years ago that I got off the couch and decided I would try to run to the corner and back (1/2 mile round trip). It was a huge struggle! Three months ago I beat one of the top and probably best known Ultra runners in the world in a 50 mile race through the mountains. I'm not gifted. I'm just stubborn and diligent."  Andy Denman

When I first read those words it sent chills up my spine.  That's why we run, because somewhere in the deep recesses of our souls exists this undeniable primal instinct.  We run to feel alive.  To feel warm blood rushing through our veins.  To hear the thumping of our pounding hearts.  The burn of our laboring lungs.  The aching muscles contracting in our weary legs.  All this, is to feel life.