Fork in the Road: “When You Know You Will Be LAST!” BEATING THE ENEMY WITHIN

In life there are crossroads and these paths will determine your destiny. What do you do when you come to the fork in the road? Do you take the path least traveled, go the way that most people go, or turn back around? This was the decision I had to make when I stood on the starting line last Saturday morning to run my first official race of the 2017 Cross Country season.

Sweat was running down my back and the race didn't even begin yet. Fear started to grip me and I could not understand why I was so scared. I’ve run this course many times by myself, with the kids and with my track team. I was reminded by my bestie, Kisha my running partner, that I was on our home field. I should have felt comfortable but I wasn’t. I wanted to kick of my running sneaks and sit in the car.

Then I started thinking about how I use to run this course. If this was 10 years ago, I would have completed the race in a little over 25 minutes. Now, I am almost 10 minutes slower and would be happy just to make it up the 3 hills without walking. My mind started coming up with excuses. “It’s hot out today, you would do better if it was cooler”, “You can sit this one out, there are 5 meets to go” and "You know how your race anxiety is setup”, but I had to find a way to shut all these negative thoughts up.

So, I put on my ear phones, turned on my music, and started talking to myself. I asked myself, “Why are you so scared? You have done this many, many times before and you just ran the course last Thursday”. Then it hit me, I was at the fork in the road. I knew the times of everyone out there expect  one woman. If you know anything about running cross country, the Open Women run with the high school students and occasionally there are some we beat, but when I sized up the field that day, I realized that today was not that day. All the Open Women started having a conversation because check in was a little long. Then the only woman, who time I did not know, said she use to run this course in high school in 19 minutes. Well, I’ve never run any 5k course that fast and after that the anxiety really kicked in on full blast. She said she was not in running shape but does aerobics all the time, and you could tell. She looked powerful.

Then I had to face the source of my fear, “WHAT DO YOU DO, WHEN YOU KNOW, YOU WILL BE LAST?” I know most of you are saying, what does this have to do with real life, I am not a runner, but life will have situations that even giving your best,  you still will come up short. I had to make a choice was I going to go out fighting or was I going to lie down. Well, I am an Overcomer. So, I got on that line and I realized that the race is not with the person beside you, the race is with the person within. I was determined to run my race. I started off slow and steady. I had to fight the anxiety off the whole entire time but I did not walk up the hills and I finished the 5k run like I was running the 100-meter dash. No, I was not first, I was last. I beat the negative thoughts demon. I gave it my all. I even dropped my time by 1 minute and 4 seconds. I took the road least traveled. Last place felt like first place because I BEAT THE ENEMY WITHIN.