Endurance is Love

When I began exploring endurance activities, I quickly came across this concept. Endurance is love. The guys over at nonprophet have a podcast dancing through this concept and how it applies to a person not just an event. Until yesterday I thought I knew what this meant. In my own context endurance was an avenue to improve my ability to love, both myself and others. Pacing and nutrition strategies while training and performing carry over to self care in day to day life. It gave me energy to love others with the love language I speak, one of acts of service. It was amazing to see that this new physical skill was able to improve my life in such a profound way. Just as lifting and strength sport taught me to be confident and analytic in problem solving, endurance taught me to care for others and have the energy to show it. It taught me to love. My experience yesterday on a bike expanded this more deeply than I had thought possible.

Miles 0-40: This was something I had grown to love spending more time riding this summer, feeling untouchable and agile, cutting through the wind up and down and around hills and obstacles with grace. These 40 miles are why people cycle. It is fun.

40-51: Sooner than I anticipated I realized how hard finishing my arbitrary task was going to be. This realization really killed my moral.

51-60: If my route had a crux I would consider it to be this. 9 miles on beach sand filled with rock and gravel. This was the only section of the ride that wasn't on road. It was slow going but luckily the road had just been graded so it was easier than anticipated which was a nice moral boost.

60-82: This was getting into the type of endurance experience I was farmilar with, a deep effort. I had felt this before on Shasta and Orizaba as well as other hard days out on the trail. This is the point where a sort of ego death starts to occur. You stop becoming a person and start becoming a task. Here I rarely thought, but when I did, all I could think was "I am become bike."

82-85: At this point something profound happened. I was searching for motivation in safe corners of my mind and of course Samwise comes in and says "I can't carry it for you but I can carry you!" Now I'm on the verge of tears, I think about how much I love my family, Candace, my friends, the earth. I'm still pedaling but I can't stop crying.

85-88: I'd seen many other cyclists out, but all were going another direction. A saw a woman about 400yds out and I punched up to her and politely asked if she would break wind for me for a while. She did kindly and we talked about how nice of a day it was. When our trails split I told her "you've done your good deed for the day." This was, at the time, one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me. Which seems ridiculous in hindsight.

88-100: After my savior left, I was back alone with my verge of tears at the wonder of the universe. My legs didn't hurt anymore. Breathing wasn't labored. Never after 90 miles in the saddle did I think I would be able to punch up the foothills coming back from the coast without feeling it at all. The effort of the effort had left. All that was left was love.

Reading this might seem like I was on drugs. How could sitting on a bike and moving for 6 hours induce such a blissful state of mind providing a catalyst for a love I didn't know existed. I don't love to cycle. That is not what was keeping me going. It wasn't a love of craft or creature. It was a love of the love of crafts and creatures. All of it together under each pedal stroke, the strongest most biding metaphysical force in the universe. And I was an antenna, vibrating upon the density of this signal all around me. My expository explaination about endurance isn't moot, it was just incomplete. This ride has afforded me some depth to that statement in question. It has revealed more truth.

Endurance is love.