"Never give up on something that you can't go a day without thinking about." Winston Churchill

I never, never, never would have dreamed that running and fitness would be that something for me. I started down this path to lose weight; to turn 50 years old and feel like myself again. That's it. But I realized pretty quickly that something much bigger was happening. Weight loss had only been the carrot (no pun intended) to get me in the door. It took almost no time for me to recognize that I wanted to be all in, even though I'm still learning how to do that. I couldn't imagine what this was all for: I was turning 50. I wasn't physically gifted. Why in the world was this calling me so deeply? It was ridiculous. Still, I couldn't get enough of it. I couldn't get enough of the races and the athletes and what all of it meant. I asked tons of questions and read books and listened to podcasts. And I continued to train and want more and more for myself.

Honestly, I still don't know the answer to the question What is it all for? But, I do know my life has transformed. I do know that I continue to be given things--things like confidence, gratitude and grit--that feed the direction I am heading in. Writing is unfolding for me at warp speed, and in multiple directions. Even a new business idea is brewing--and all of it from running. It seems that everything I need to know, I can learn from running.

So, it's simple: I'll continue to pursue running and fitness. I'll continue to throw everything I've got into this. And in return, in exchange, I am given the directions I need to my life. Maybe it sounds kooky. But when I turn around and I am able to catch a glimpse of who I was and where I stood at the start of this, and then I see who I am now, it seems fair and reasonable and actually wise to trust that I have been given some pretty solid direction through this experience. My compass points towards running, and running points out what I need to learn and where I need to go. I like what I've learned and I like what's unfolding.

I like this path. I'm grateful for it, and I'm gonna let it chart my course.