I took up running at twelve. At the same time, I took up writing daily. So I’ve had plenty of time to see what they have in common and how it pays to take the long view.
One of the books I read early on stressed the importance of cross-training for runners and the dangers of overtraining. How overdoing led to injury and cut short the enjoyment of what should be a life-long sport. I read that in my early 20s and it was a new idea to me. If some is good, more isn’t better? My philosophy has always been “anything worth doing is worth overdoing.” But here was this idea that you’re in it for life, not for a year or a month, so you should plan accordingly and train accordingly. The author of this book was especially worried about losing promising young athletes to overtraining.
The book went on to discuss the fact that there are highs and lows over a lifetime of doing something. Good years, bad years, average years. One year injury or surgery might put you on the sidelines, and it’s okay, because you have the rest of your life. You come back the next year and you keep running.
All of this applies to writing. It’s easy to start comparing yourself to somebody else, how they’re running their race, how fast they are off the start. But in the end, both writing and running are solitary pursuits and the only person you’re competing against is you. You have your race to run, I have mine. I have my hill to get up, you have yours. Am I running the best I can now? Not comparing myself to how fast or how well I ran yesterday or last year because it’s gone. What I have is now, this moment, this race. This chance to give everything I have and at the same time remember to pace myself because it’s not a sprint, it’s about endurance.
But, but, but…what about publishing? What if somebody else writes that book before I do, what if all the slots are filled up, what if we can’t afford to take the long view? Sprint, sprint, sprint!
I don’t think we can afford not to take the long view. I’m in this for life. I started writing daily at 12 and I’m still doing it, almost thirty years later. I will be doing it thirty years from now. Some years I felt like a genius and other years I felt like a drooling idiot with a pen. Feelings don’t mean much. The work is the work, it’s what I have to do, and how I feel about it really doesn’t matter. Am I doing well? I hope so. But the important thing is to keep doing it.
Both writing and running have enriched my life in too many ways to count. Why did I take a break from running? I found it too hard to do after a c-section. I figured if it hurt that much, my body wasn’t ready for it. So I walked and hiked instead. I was just getting back to jogging after child #1 when I got pregnant with child #2. And now after about the same interval my body’s ready. And it’s still fun. It still feels good and clears my lungs and my head and gives me an overall boost in energy. Nothing’s changed, except after the time away from running I can’t go for ten miles. I’ll have to work up to that again.
Both writing and running provide a unique sort of high, a positive addiction. If I didn’t enjoy both, if it didn’t feel good, I’d find something else to do with my time on planet earth. I’m not a masochist. Overall, writing is fun and running is fun. Sometimes you run into limits or obstacles that are frustrating and challenging. Some days, you never get past the warming up stage and into the zone. But the next day, you hit the zone right away and soar the whole time.
So it goes, year after year. Ups and downs. Dips, valleys, twists, curves. How could it be anything else? You really never can step in the same river twice. The river moves on and so do you and change happens. Every day is new. Every moment writing is new.
Every book is a unique challenge because no matter how many you may have written, you’ve never written THAT book before. And the awful truth is, what worked for the last book probably won’t help now. But if you did it once, you can do it again. And again, and again, for a lifetime. I’ve finished 17 novels and novellas and too many short stories, poems, essays and articles to count. I have more in the works and I’ll finish them, too. Some days I will soar the whole way, laugh at the goal I set for myself and do twice as much. The next day, maybe I’ll do a recovery lap. But day in and day out, I choose to write. That’s what makes me a writer.
