The Making of My Mantra

    Menopausal Mother of Four Seeks Active Challenging Life Full of Loving Relationships

I've explained my desire to run a Marathon and my intention to document the journey in this blog. In an effort to make it easier to understand my posts, I decided that a small bit of background information would probably be useful and somewhat necessary.

My life experiences are now effectively the "back story". If you are going to know me, you must know at least some of it. I was married young. I had my first daughter, CareBear*, at 21. Three more children followed over a period of 11 years- a daughter Slari*, a son Bubba*, and a daughter Smelly*. I was divorced after 20 years of marriage but was fortunate to have my former husband become my forever friend. I lost my CareBear 6 years ago and my forever friend 3 years later. Both to suicide.

Sports psychologist recommend that athletes find a mantra to help them during times of stress:

"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger", That could be a good mantra to use while training for a marathon. Problem is, I don't accept it as the truth. I feel it is more likely that "what doesn't kill you, mortally wounds you and changes you in ways that you never fully understand."

"It is what it is". This is a good mantra to help a person accept a situation that is out of their control. It is passive and calming. It could help in marathon training during those days when the runs are hard and the times and distances are disappointing. Still, it seems that something more dynamic and empowering would be better.

My Coach and I have discussed running and training philosophies. I want to "take what my body gives me". This attitude allows me to constantly reassess how I feel and thus how much I push myself. It is defined by peaceful negotiations between mind and body. Coach feels that we should "transcend what our bodies are telling us", so that our minds are fighting for control over our bodies. When the mind wins, the body gives us more than would have been possible otherwise.

I respect that philosophy and can see how it would benefit me. I don't know that I can fully embrace it, mostly because I find all conflict stressful especially internal conflict. We set out to run 10 miles today. It was a hard run, for whatever reason, and I was in constant negotiation with myself in order to find a way to complete it.

The result: 10 miles
The reward: Peanut M&M's


*nickname as an alias