Jung at Heart: Fear of Failure

Scroll down further to Brian's post. Glad to hear Brian's enjoying Yuengling in Bethesda as much as I did in Virginia. Treadmill's great if the weather is that bad; I may have to join a gym just for this reason.

As I prepare my race get up for tomorrow, (laminated 2167 bib on my Cox technical shirt and the familiar Nike shorts and NB 903 combo) I forgot to post this months ago but still applies.

Warning: this post is riddled with Psych 101 jibberish from my brain before a race.

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself"-Franklin Delano Roosevelt

After running more seriously for the past two years, it has come to my attention a day before my mile race that I need to remove that proverbial bar that keeps moving up. It seems as though at that first race, there was no bar and in fact, I had run for fun (if you're idea of fun is running) a whole year without racing. Doing well was just a by-product of running consistently and having no pressure at all on myself.

At some point or another, we have all been successful. As we grow older, we shy away from that which we may possibly not be the best at. It's the hand on the burning stove of the adult world. This concern was addressed early on in the team and I think it is a great concern not only to running but to life.

As the famed Nike creator Coach Bowerman put it, "Running, one might say, is basically an absurd past-time upon which to be exhausting ourselves. But if you can find meaning, in the kind of running you have to do to stay on this team, chances are you will be able to find meaning in another absurd past-time: Life."

(This reminds me, I gotta watch "Without Limits" on YouTube as part of my pre-race ritual)

The way I see it, you have to see running as more than just aiming for a personal record (PR) or trying to be better than everyone else.

You have to realize that this is beneficial for your heart, shows character in overcoming obstacles, and ultimately, you find out that the real goal in life is to do the best that YOU can do. Setting yourself up for failure without a great plan and being hard on yourself will have you likely ending up like a failed American Idol contestant. With running, you can look at your running log and see objectively where you can improve and where you can project yourself at the race. I think for earlier races one has to just set a goal of finishing the race because that in itself is a major accomplishment.

Or look at it like our past college applications. Have a reach school, a safety school, and ... A school?
a) very tough goal
b) pretty tough goal
c) do-able goal

(ie sub 7, sub 7:30, sub 8 tomorrow at my race)

It's very tough to train for weeks (or months) on end and to not meet a goal (if you only set one) is a bit of a downer.

To hone in on the point I was trying to make, I'll just reiterate what I wrote earlier this week about looking at the big picture; you can't tell me that this team is worse off for having turned in to runners. I'll take this team (and my new self) over the kids that looked like us before running.