Weird running, sort of running, on the island last evening. After three days of thick fog, a breeze was clearing the air. I decided to run Cedar Grove, trying to get to the bluff for sunset and follow my brand new, hasn’t been taken outside yet, six-LED lantern back to the car.

I sometimes wonder what sort of fool drivers think they are seeing, if they see us at all, as I pull on the last layer–rain shell, gloves, cap, pat pockets for lights–and head off into the drizzle. Crunch, crunch, crunch down the gravel, winding away from the sound of cars hurrying home, I round the curve and their lights go away. The dusk of evening thickens as memory takes me down Humpty Dump to Alder Grove and up to Escape. Cold water splashes from brushed limbs. The gravel road is left behind and the leaves of a thousand trees hide all sound–breathing and heartbeats become the only noise–their rhythm joins my legs as I turn onto Cedar Grove.

In “Last Child in the Woods” we are told the current generation is not going out in the woods; is not leaving the protective supervision of playgrounds in subdivisions; is losing the imagination nature wants us to develop. These are my woods most of the time, the place my imagination plays. An old child wandering along, unsupervised.

I pass the Old Men, fog shrouded, cedar boughs bent and dripping brush my shoulder as I start the drop into the kettle and darkness. It is too cloudy for sunset and dropping down the side of the kettle the challenge that has been whispering comes forth loudly: You can get to the bluff without turning on the light if you hurry.

Hurry? Well, at least shuffle faster. Ohkeigh. Up the switchbacks wondering how many trails do I know how many switchbacks they each have? Dimple, Stick in the Eye, Butterfield, this one, and that one across the water–water? The clouds have lifted enough to see the Olympic Mountains over on the peninsula. One last ray of sunset fights for its glory as I come up out of the kettle above the Straits of Juan de Fuca.

I sat on a knotted root of a many years old Alaskan Cedar scanning the waters, looking at mountains silhouetted across the sound. As I glance down, a patch of white moves, then another–two adult bald eagles are enjoying sunset on the beach. Maybe the huge nest that was empty last year will have a family this year. I leave in the gathering darkness, right, left, past the fallen one, right, and around to the top. No lights yet.

The games we play. Can I make it to Grancy’s Run without turning on my brand new flashlight? The bluff is left behind. The sun’s last ray snuffed as I turn downward to the quarter-mile of pavement on the park road and left toward Grancy’s. An owl’s hoo-hoo-huaoo greets me as I lengthen the stride. The gate I made last August greets me. Gates and benches made by my hands–they hold so much more than do the programs written on the screens at other times. I slip by the gate and start down the alley of darkness. A mile and a tenth to the car. My eyes enjoy a seldom felt challenge. It’s only dark for another quarter-mile, then the whiteness of the old gravel road will be visible. I slip the light back into its scabbard.

Gravel crunches ‘neath my feet as I follow the ghostly whisper of white through the alleys of ocean spray, cedar, and alder. The lights of cars on the highway tell me another night run is over. My last few steps are drowned by the hiss and whine of tires on asphalt. I pause at the last turn to look back–some nights we leave something out there. I’ll go back tomorrow to make sure it’s ohkeigh.

John E. Morelock, February 2007

John Morelock writes the “Run Gently Out There” column featured in Ultrarunning magazine and ran his first ultra in 1986. He has completed several ultras – most of them in the Pacific Northwest. He lives on Whidbey Island in Washington state with his wife, Kathy.

Graveyard Jazz – John Morelock Multidays.com - Multiday and Ultrarunning News

“Running. Cheaper Than Therapy.” I can’t remember where I first saw that slogan, but it made me laugh. As a runner, I recognize that I run because it makes me happy. I do much of my training alone. My running, sometimes, offers me space to think. I can cover miles while contemplating the mysteries of my life.

As a therapist, I spend countless hours invested in the struggles of others. To de-clutter my mind, I often need peace, quiet, and time for myself. Sometimes I think about nothing at all. Anyone who knows me can attest to how challenging it is for me to quiet my thoughts. Once in a while, on a great run, I can do it. I will look down at my watch and realize a significant amount of time has passed and I can’t remember thinking about a single thing. Those days are amazing!

But most days, my running is simply mathematics in motion. Lots of math. Hours of math. Math relevant to the run that I am doing. Math relevant to the runs I have done. Math relevant to the runs I want to do in the future. I am good at math, but not as good as I should be after the amount of time I spend practicing it.

For me, the days that I think about nothing or distract myself with math are better than those days when my runs are spent processing the stressors of my life. Maybe math is the secret? “Math. Cheaper Than Therapy.” Hmm, I probably wont sell a lot of those T-shirts.

I recognize that there is a difference between “something that is therapeutic” and “therapy”. But first, it is important to note that there has been success with using exercise to manage symptoms of clinical level anxiety, depression or other mood disorders. It is an excellent intervention, used in conjunction with other types of treatment, when the source of the problem is unknown or cannot be remedied and therefore managing symptoms is the ultimate goal.

Many runners, even those without a clinically diagnosable disorder, would likely agree that running is therapeutic because it helps us cope with stress. However, coping with stress or managing symptoms often does not solve underlying problems. In most cases, unless our biggest stressor is not being a good-enough runner, then running, on its own, is really not the solution. Running, whether it be through the woods, on the roads, at some destination race, or even on a treadmill, will always drop us off in the same place we started. The relief of symptoms after a run is real, but it is temporary. Symptoms will likely return until we can run again or resolve a conflict. Longer lasting change does not generally happen unless we are able to implement some of the ideas we spent hours developing while on the run. Therefore, it is often the actions we take (or decide to not take) after the run that resolves our conflicts.

Or is it the act of running that changes us? From a cognitive behavioral perspective, I do believe the act of running, on its own, may have tremendous value as an agent for intrapersonal change.
Not without its critics, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is considered a highly effective evidence-based psychotherapeutic intervention for a wide range of conditions. Under CBT theory, our behavior is shaped by our beliefs (or constructs) about ourselves and the world we live in. When maladaptive beliefs shape our behaviors, they act to perpetuate conflict, stress, and/or dysfunction. Because how we behave impacts how we are received, perceived, and reacted to by others, our beliefs get reinforced as accurate and factual, even if they are simply misperceptions. In other words, we create self-fulfilling prophecies that keep us stuck. By challenging our constructs, maladaptive beliefs are uncovered. Once we realize that what we believe to be truths are actually inaccurate opinions, our behaviors change and our world is experienced differently. As a result, conflicts, distress, and/or dysfunction resolve.

But what does this have to do with running? In actual practice, effective CBT interventions are carefully crafted to address maladaptive beliefs that perpetuate specific disorders. We already discussed that being a successful runner is not a solution to non-running problems. However measurable success as a runner has the power to reshape the beliefs we hold about ourselves as people.

For those who care to track data (and it seems most runners do track the data that is important to them), running offers us clear and concrete measurable goals and results. If it is truly important to us, we will know if we actually ran a mile (or 100 miles) and just how long we took to do it. Even without a watch, we know if we ran “better” than last time. If we run further, faster, more frequently, or cover more challenging terrain with more ease than we ever thought possible, we know it. In time, it becomes clear that running changes our beliefs about how strong we are, how much we can endure, and how much heart we have. This is a significant cognitive shift that not only shapes how we perceive ourselves as runners but also how we perceive ourselves as people.

Running truly has no finish line. Because the experience of completing a challenging run is incredibly rewarding, runners are easily compelled to challenge themselves repeatedly. As a result, it is no surprise that ultrarunning is a fast growing sport. Hundred mile races are now more popular than ever. People who never imagined they could complete a marathon are now daydreaming about multi-day racing.

Beside offering concrete measurable goals and the opportunity to manage stress, running, just like a good therapy session, teaches us how to use metaphors to make sense of our world. We learn how the climbs always seem worse from the bottom. We learn that every great run starts with the courage to take the first step. We learn that if we fall down, we have to get up, dust ourselves off, and get back at it. Running teaches us that if we plan well, work hard, stay focused, fight through challenges, take care of our basic needs, and have gear that works, then we have a good chance at discovering we are capable of amazing things. Running ultimately teaches us that we are only as weak as we believe we are. All these lessons ring true for life as well.

The cognitive shift running creates within us is often life-altering. Our confidence builds. Challenges scare us less. Suddenly ridiculous things become reasonable goals. As a result, people treat us differently because we act differently. We begin to discover “new” opportunities that likely have always been present. Most importantly, if our conflicts or stressors were a product of our own insecurities about ourselves, the increase in self-confidence running brings can result in solutions in our non-running world.

This is all wonderful stuff, but not everyone is good at self-discovery and change. Some people will simply run in circles, never really challenging their constructs, never solving problems, or never breaking old patterns. Some people need more than just a therapeutic activity to help them through their pain. Unfortunately, there is still a great resistance towards asking a therapist for help, even within a group of people who will so proudly declare “Running is my therapy!”

I don’t believe that everyone who finds therapeutic value in running needs to sit down and discuss their experience with a professional. A good test to determine whether you need more than just running to help resolve a conflict is to reflect upon how long you have been stuck on the same problem. Have you been able to significantly change or overcome any part of your struggle on your own? If not, then running may be a wonderful therapeutic activity for coping with stress, but a therapist may be necessary to give you the support and guidance you need while you wrestle with the hard parts of life.

Finally, is running cheaper than therapy? I am sure it used to be back when running around for no reason was considered abnormal. Now the secret is out. People are rapidly discovering the therapeutic life-altering value of distance running. Thanks to supply and demand, running and racing is getting more expensive. It is now becoming a race to secure a bib for ultras. That used to be a marathon problem. As I look at the rising costs of ultras, where my personal therapy most often takes place, I am starting to think that I may need to print up a new T-shirt. “Therapy. Cheaper Than Running.” Hmm, I don’t think that would sell very well either. It is almost as bad at the one about math.

Shannon McGinn is a running coach based in and around Woodbridge, NJ. Checkout Shannon’s blog, Creating Momentum for more ideas and thoughts that inspired “High Mileage And Low Injury Rate”.

Running as Therapy by Shannon McGinn Multidays.com - Multiday and Ultrarunning News

In sports psychology, we talk a lot about positive self-talk when teaching athletes to train, manage and control their internal chat. We hone in on being optimistic, and if it’s not, we encourage athletes to always pull their thoughts back to being optimistic. But a lot of sport psychology folks aren’t ultra runners or even endurance athletes and aren’t intimate with the unique psychological rigors of going really long. As an athlete, optimism should always be your aspiration, and its important to create a training process to generate this type of mind set, but in the world of endurance sports we know that positive isn’t always possible for the long haul.

When I first started learning about and using positive self-talk in my training and racing as a triathlete, I started at the beginning—noticing my general dialogue in various aspects of my athletic life. I then implemented positive self-talk words and phrases to replace the negative, as well as affirmations and imagery I designed over time. After several weeks of consistent focused mental training I noticed that in events or training sessions of a few hours or shorter I could remain positive, for the most part. But carrying this process into Ironman events, 100-mile ultra running races, or continuous or staged multi-day races, remaining positive was virtually impossible unless I flat out lied to myself.

Using word cues such as, “I am light and strong” just doesn’t sit right when you are at mile 85 of a 100-mile running race shuffling through some of the toughest stretch of trail in the country in the middle of the night, and you just clipped your blistered big toe on a rock and endo-ed into the creek because your hip flexors are too shot to lift your feet any higher than a shuffle. In situations like this, somehow even “patience,” seems like a bunch of crap.

You don’t need 85 miles of running behind you to get to this particular head space; you can thwart your positive thoughts on a long training jaunt or in a weary 8 miler if it’s just not your day. In any case, if you can’t seem to get positive, what do you do? You get rational. Rational basically means lucid, balanced, coherent, or sane. If “positive” is eluding you, isn’t sanity a pretty good second choice?

Here’s what your rational voice might look like.

Thought: “I’m so tired, I’m not sure I can keep going.”

Thought stopping cue: “STOP!”

Replace negative thought with rational thought: “Walk and eat a gel packet,” or, “Walk to the next telephone pole, stretch, then start running slowly.”

Rational self-talk speaks to the essential aspects of how you can stay in the game: eating, drinking, proper pacing, negotiating terrain and just generally continuing to move forward. The key is that it prevents your mind from going to the negative. That is our goal. Rational self-talk gives your body instructions when it wants to quit. A client who frequently uses rational talk commented, “I pick a spot on the trail and I tell myself I will return to full mental and physical peak at that point. This helps me a lot rather that trying to turn an emotion on a dime, which can become a bit of a punching bag sometimes.”

In longer events or in events of any distance that challenge your fitness level, the body wants to quit when the going gets really tough. The mind must step in to prod the body forward. The body waits for a weakness to allow it to slow, but the mind can’t allow for it. Your mind propels. If you can’t reach for positive to squelch the negative demons, reach for rational—your body will thank you and you’ll keep the negative thoughts at bay.

Here are some more rational self-talk words and phrases that are helpful:

“Slow your pace.”

“Pump your arms on this hill.”

“Pick up your feet.”

“Take an electrolyte tablet in 3 minutes.”

“Start running at the next tree.”

“Focus.”

“Stay with me.”

I have used rational self-talk in all of my Ironman races and have carried that process into many one and multi-day ultra running events and adventure races. I have never taken for granted that it will be there, I have trained it to be there—just like my positive self-talk. Rational self-talk, just like positive self-talk, can offer you satisfying event experiences. It can keep you present to your race strategy. Used in conjunction with your positive self-talk, it is a powerful tool for your mental toolbox.

Terri Schneider is a coach, sport psychology consultant, speaker, writer and multi-sport endurance athlete. Visit Terri at www.terrischneider.net.

When the Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get—Rational – Terri Schneider Multidays.com - Multiday and Ultrarunning News

West Fork Dosewallips River Trail
NPS Jim Patterson

Reasons to be Slow…

I hereby resolve to be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent, but not necessarily in that order and maybe not each of them all of the time, nor all of them at the same time, nor for the whole year, and I am still subject to bribes, gifts, and nepotism. A couple of chocolate chip cookies and the whole thing goes out the window.

Bummer. I just noticed “…keeps clean in body and thought…”–maybe this isn’t going to work after all. I would probably drop the whole thing for eight months of hard, healthy training and one more trip to [insert favorite run here].

Over the years as I have ran along the roads, trails, byways, and bypaths I have blamed just about everything imaginable: bristle cone pines, “Alice in Wonderland” caterpillars, really old redwoods, newly bloomed alpine meadows, fields of ice frosted grass glistening on a winter morning, a porcupine wondering what I was doing on “her” trail, whales, beavers, waterfalls, lava beds, mushroom cities, armadillos, cacti, great blue herons, stars at two o’clock in the morning, rainbows, a pair of eyes looking back in the flashlight beams, snow as the trail went up and down a ridge line, a solstice’s full moon lighting our trail, snakes, rabbits, leaves falling, ravens rising, fog and sun streaks and shadows through the fog, and even bad burritos for my taking too long to cover a particular piece of ground.

I once stopped dead in my tracks during the Aptos No Creek Trail Marathon when rounding a curve in a redwood grove to acknowledge a tree; possibly 25 feet in diameter, branches way far above me and over 3 feet thick–for over 2,000 years it had been standing there, patiently waiting for me to pass. How long it took me to complete that course that day just could not matter; could not compare to the wonder I felt in running ‘neath the branches of the giants.

My wife and I still look up into the Olympic National Park from the ferry as we cross an arm of Puget Sound and remember the time we took the better part of an early spring day covering 38 miles of trails, crossing two passes and three snow-field fed, bone-chilling icy cold rivers, slowly rounding the shoulder of Mt. Constance and heading on down the trail along the bank of the Dosewallups River–no T-shirts, no finishing clocks, no time goals–just hoping our daughter had moved our car around to where we were going to finish–even that was forgotten many times as we passed in and out of timber stands watched by curious mountain goats, stopped at another waterfall…just runnin’, that was all we were doing.

Every now and then I still run with time in mind, but mostly I just run with being out there in mind, if I can get my mind to be there at all.

John Morelock

John Morelock writes the “Run Gently Out There” column featured in Ultrarunning magazine and ran his first ultra in 1986. He has completed several ultras – most of them in the Pacific Northwest. He lives on Whidbey Island in Washington state with his wife, Kathy.

Reasons To Be Slow – John Morelock Multidays.com - Multiday and Ultrarunning News