goal – Betsy Schow

…now what?

So, I made my goal. Finished a marathon in under 5 hours. Now what?

I’ve trained for this moment for 5 months. Put 10+ hours a week into it. Counted down the weeks, days, then hours until I would cross the start line. And now it’s over. And I’m left feeling a little bit like the 3rd day after Christmas. The anticipation is gone, the excitement of the new toys has passed. And all that’s left is mountain of packaging and even larger mountain of credit card bills.

My knees remind every step of my accomplishment, like the after haunt of too much fruitcake. But the great thing about Christmas, is that it comes again.

My daughters favorite movie is Tangled. And in that movie, Rapunzel hesitates to throw her lantern in the air, because then her dream is fulfilled. And she will be left with nothing. Flynn tells her that all you do is find a new dream.

Floating in a river aimlessly, is nice every once and a while. But most of the time, we need a heading. A destination. Something to reach for, to dream about.

I’m not sure what my new goal will be. But there will definitely be one. And I look forward to the work, sweat, and tears its going to take to reach it. So right now, instead of the post marathon depression, this should be the most exciting part. The part where the possibilities are endless, and I can choose anything for my to do list.

To quote the last line of Pretty Woman, Some dreams come true, some don’t; but keep on dreamin’ – this is Hollywood. Always time to dream, so keep on dreamin’.

The Long Run: You can do hard things

Today’s long run is 18 miles. I’m not gonna lie, it’s given me heart palpitations all week. It’s big and scary and really, really, hard.

So this week I have been repeating our family mantra- You can do hard things.

The mantra was given to us by my daughter’s occupational therapist. When my daughter was 4 yrs old, she refused to do anything. Everything was too hard. Tying her shoes, walking, getting dressed… you name it. She stopped trying to do anything because she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to do it. It was going to be too hard. That’s when her therapist told her that it’s ok that the big scary thing was hard. Because she was a supergirl. And she could do hard things. It took some convincing and a whole lot of practice, but now all it usually takes is that gently reminder to get her back on course.

I’m not four but I still have the same problems. I look at something and all the work it’s gonna take and I say nu uh. It’s too hard. I don’t want to do it.

I know for sure I can run 18 miles. I’ve run 26.2. But even though I know I can do it doesn’t mean it’s not going to be tough. It’s still intimidating, but I just have to tell myself over and over that I can do hard things. I grew two little human beings. It doesn’t get much harder than that.

So everytime I feel that little tendril of fear creeping into my belly and want to crawl back in my shell, I look back and find something I’ve done that was tough, but I survived anyway. So take that 18 miles, I can do hard things.

Exercise for the Soul: Make the impossible possible

A year ago, the idea of me completing a marathon was laughable. It was an impossible goal. Through lots of little successes, training hard, and learning to finish, I made it through 26.2 grueling miles. Now I am training to do it again.

Find something in your life that you think you could never ever do. Something really hard. Don’t pick something that requires alot of luck or connections, like becoming a pop star. Pick something that is tough to achieve because it takes hard work. Speaking in front of a crowd of 200. Running 5 miles. Losing 25 pounds. Finishing school. Find something, then knuckle down and do it.

Funny thing about doing the impossible, it makes everything possible.