If you TRULY Believe, you CAN Truly Do Anything
In honor of it, let’s “believe” 2021 will be the best ever.
You might be surprised what a little faith might do to your wishes.
A little over 2 weeks ago, I noticed I ran 534 miles this year (despite never running more than possibly 25 or more a year). It blew me away when I hit 500, but a little thought creeped into my head right after I saw this number.
I quickly converted it over to kilometers out of curiosity and saw it was “up there” in terms of digits. I wondered to myself, “how close would this be to 1000?“
After quickly converting it, I realized I had ~141 km to go to hit 1000! I thought to myself, “that can’t be too much in miles, could it?” Well…
Math Skills Finally Serving Some Use
Quickly using my “9th grade Math Student of the Year” skills, I noticed that it was only about 82 miles’ish. Doing a bit more math, I measured it out to be 11.7 miles a day for 7 runs — I knew I had no more than 7 or 8 opportunities to possibly execute on this crazy idea. The most I ran this past year of “living life to its fullest (and frankly, my entire life!),” was 14 kilometers split into 2 separate runs. This new pace was easily 4 km+ more than that “best day.” And I would have to replicate this incredible feat 7 times in a row!?? Could I do it???
Guess what? I started to “believe.”
Up through that point, I was running between 3 to 6 miles (at most). Frankly, the 6 mile run was an anomaly b/c it was more like 3-5 miles on each of my runs. Honestly, I was content with it, but this new goal seemed potentially within reach.
So, I said “Screw my body. Let’s see what I can do!?”
I couldn’t believe it, but I ran more than I had ever in a single run. You see, that 14 kilometers was (again) broken up into 2 runs. This one straight shot down Marina del Rey had literally set a personal best (pb).
Killing Myself
My body was in excruciating pain, but my mind started to say, “You could do it.”
If I haven’t said it enough, I hated running. No, I detested, despised and literally loathed this activity that kills the joints and right before the runs from this year, I worried about needing possible hip surgery.
However, it was less than the 11.7 miles I had set as a pace I would need to hit. So, the very next day, I ran another 2.36 miles to get close to the pace. My body was telling me to “go f*ck yourself,” but my brain yelled back and said “go f*ck yourself even more!”
So, the day after, I decided to run another 8 miles, but as a result of my schedule that day and a surprise call from a gal I had just recently swiped right with, I only ended up with 6+ miles.
Noticing that I wasn’t close to the 11.7 miles every other day, I ran another 4.19 miles later that night. In total, I had run over 20+ miles in 3 days. I was really believing I could do it — while dying in agony at home after the longer runs.
I had to rest. So, I took my first full day off in a few days and prepared for the run on the 19th. I was more determined than ever to reach that 11.7 miles goal.
Just do it
At first, the run was the same old pain where it takes about a mile or 2 to start warming up. After I got past the first couple, I started wondering “maybe I could reach the virgin territory?” But for some reason, it was tougher today than it was the past few days. When I got to mile 8, I thought, “I can’t do it. I can’t run this entire length.” So, I walked for a bit. However, I told myself “I MUST do this.” I began running again. For the next 4 miles, I walked, ran, walked and then ran. The last two miles, I ran enough where I would at least attain a pace that didn’t feel like walking. While it was slow, I got the 12.2 miles done! Even though the pace was slower, I felt like I truly did it.
I literally just ran the most I had ever. I destroyed my body while doing so, but it was an accomplishment I’ll never forget.
From there on, it got easy. I didn’t have to actually run the 11.7 miles (~18.8 km). Somehow, I had gotten a tad ahead of myself and ended up only needing to run 8-9 miles (12.8-14.5 kms) every other day to achieve my goal. Maybe my 9th grade math skills were rusty?
A little after a week ad a 1/2 later, I’m at 990 kilometers or only 6.21 miles (~10 km) away from hitting this crazy goal that seemed impossible. After running 12.2 miles once and 8+ miles four times in a row, I felt like this was destined to be achieved!
Breaking Records
I’ve also run more this month than any of the previous ones by a long shot:
Once this is said and done, it will represent 25+ miles more than the best month I had back in June — the month I had the 14 km (~8.69 miles) run, I believe.
- March: 6.4 miles (over 5 runs at 11’05’)
- April: 59.4 miles (21 runs at 13’27”; note, I spent a lot of time calling, writing, etc. on the runs)
- May: 71.2 miles (19 runs at 13’15”; same note)
- June: 84.9 miles (18 runs at 12’07”; similar issues here)
- July: 30.6 miles (13 runs at 11’39”; getting more focused on the pace)
- August: 61.9 miles (22 runs at 10’20”)
- September: 75.9 miles (29 runs at 10’34”)
- October: 58.1 miles (23 runs at 9’47”)
- November: 60.9 miles (19 runs at 10’41”)
- December: 105.5 miles (20 runs at 9’49”) thus far
In Kilometers:
- March: 10.3 kms (over 5 runs at 6’53’)
- April: 95.7 kms (21 runs at 8’22”; note, I spent a lot of time calling, writing, etc. on the runs)
- May: 114.6 kms (19 runs at 8’14”; same note)
- June: 136.7 kms (18 runs at 7’32”; similar issues here)
- July: 49.3 kms (13 runs at 7’15”; getting more focused on the pace)
- August: 99.6 kms (22 runs at 6’25”)
- September: 122.2 kms (29 runs at 6’34”)
- October: 93.6 kms (23 runs at 6’05”)
- November: 98 kms (19 runs at 6’38”)
- December: 169.8 kms (20 runs at ~6’05”) thus far
2019 Wasn’t Easy
Not sure if I’ve shared this, but 2019 was one of my worst years ever. I couldn’t get myself to continue running after attempting to start about ironically 7 times. My stomach has been a little off over the past 5 years or so where it gets so hungry, it starts to feel like it’s literally eating away at things inside. I probably should get it checked out, but every time I go to the doctor, they say the same thing: let’s run some tests and after we get them back, it’s usually “You’re o.k. Just exercise and eat healthy.” LOL
In December of 2019, I literally thought I had prostate cancer (esp after my homeopathic doctor had said I have “nodules”). The urologist in January said, “Nope. You’re o.k. Just exercise and eat healthy.” After the emasculation, I was relieved (I know — any guy reading these words together must be ROFL).
Shortly before this little episode, I also had thoughts about the last 5 minutes of life. All the thoughts that Seneca had in “
How to Die,” or Randy Pausch’s “
The Last Lecture” or Paul Kalanithi’s “
When Breath Becomes Air” had become so clear that I decided moving forward, I would live every moment I could as if it were my last.
This revelation helped me start WheniLeave.com. This revelation helped me carry out acts at the day job I never thought I would ever do. This newfound “belief” let me truly become stronger than ever.
As a result, it hasn’t been that hard to achieve these 1000 kilometers (that I will have attained here in 2 days).
If I can do it, so can you.
You just need to do one thing:
Believe
Happy 2021 everyone!
It’s been a pleasure sharing my life with you.
p.s. I have one section of this post I’ll come back and share and it will be titled:
Just did it
12/31/20’s update:
- December ended up being 112.8 miles (21 runs at 9’46”)
- or 181.5 kms (21 runs at 6’04”)
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