“Believe in your own potential for greatness.”
~ Evan Tanner
Throughout the course of my life there have been many people who have inspired me; one of those is the late Evan Tanner, from Amarillo, TX. (A 3-minute preview of his documentary can be found here…I highly recommend it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufCwtz-vjIg&t=7s). Evan held the belief that we could change the world; that as a single individual, we could change the world…that our words and actions could resonate into the eternal and be passed on. Oftentimes, when people would ask why I would undertake a challenge or pursue a particular goal that seemed a little bit out of the ordinary my standard response was always, “so that I’ll have stories to tell the grandkids.”
I came across a picture from a few years ago with one of my grandchildren; we were sitting in front of the computer watching Winnie the Pooh. A few weeks ago, another picture was taken with me and the other grandchild in front of the computer watching Cocomelon. I put these two photos side by side, sent them to my daughter, and then noticed something I had never paid attention to before: the background of each picture.
One was taken when I had first started running and had completed maybe one or two races while the other is about 3.5 years later after a trans-Texas relay run, 29 races, and 55 runs of 50 km or more.
What started out as something to do to simply tell the grandkids about has turned into a lifestyle. In the first picture, the background is bare while in the current picture the background is filled with race memorabilia, posters, and over 55 books on the topics of running, sports psychology, and endurance sports. My goals and what I want out of life have gradually but radically changed; I see the world and what is important in a way that I never saw before, my definition of success changed, and the things I want to achieve in life changed as well. Trail running sparked a change that would begin to resonate with me on an intrinsic level and put me on a path to become more in tune and in touch with my surroundings; ultramarathons would only propel this transformation.
I now have stories to tell the grandkids and guess what? I want more, I want to do more, to have more stories to tell that are even wilder than the ones before; but now the motivation has begun to change, instead of doing things to tell stories, I find myself wanting to do things to set an example; I don’t want to tell the grandkids, I want to show them. By showing them; I’m changing the world.
One day when I’m no longer around maybe one of those grandkids will tell one of those stories or tell about one of those adventures and then my words, thoughts, and beliefs will have been passed on and I won’t just have changed the world, we will have changed the world.
Our sport is special in that it offers something that few other things do: an avenue to change the world. The winter months can be hard. Temperatures drop, the holidays come and go, the general pace of life picks up, and things begin to feel overwhelming. This is when it is important to remember to engage in what brought us so much peace and happiness…to “dance with the one that brought you” if you will. Motivation to train through the winter months isn’t quite as hard to find if you’ll remember that it will allow you to change the world. It will give you stories to tell the grandkids and thus allowing your words and thoughts to resonate eternally.
So, when motivation wanes: create a story, change the world.