Overcoming Obstacles Is The Best Life Story

​Yesterday, I ran the Icy8 eight hour trail race on the trails of Lake Anna State Park. When it was done, I'd run 25 miles.

I've run that far before, but not often.

Before the race, I was laughing with my friend Solomon about writing, and specifically, about writing race stories. I told him about a friend who once told me, "Keith, your problem is you want to be able to write the ending to your life story. Life isn't as easy as writing," she said.

She had a point, I suppose.

But there is also some truth in this: maybe I can't write the ending to my life story, but I can sure choose to live a life that tells the kind of story I want to write about.

I love the picture below - me crossing the finish line at the end of a long day. But it's not me I noticed first in the picture. It's the man standing to my right, watching me cross that finish line, a proud smile on his face - almost like he'd been rooting for me all day.

He had. He had been rooting for me all day. Like he'd been rooting for many others. Each time we finished a loop in the race, we reported it to him. Each time he wrote it down, he said good job. He said it with the celebratory heart of a man who knew a runner had just overcome another obstacle in life.

And people love stories of people overcoming obstacles in life.

Yesterday, after mile 20, I posted a picture of myself on Facebook. I said "5 miles to go, but it feels like 500" - I was saying, it feels like a GIANT obstacle ahead.

And people responded with a chorus of "get it" or "you can do it". A chorus that sung to me.

But, as much as people were cheering for me and my story, I believe they were cheering for themselves too. In rooting for someone else to overcome the obstacle in their lives, they feel inspired to overcome the obstacles in their own lives.

We love an overcoming the obstacles story because that's what life is - life is an overcoming the obstacles story.

When I start reading or hearing someone's story that suggests they've always been a winner, I stop reading. Give me the story of someone who has spent their life feeling like they are losing, feeling like life will never let them win, and then they decide to win anyways.

I want that story, because it's me. And it's you.

I think that's the secret to a good life, really. Owning that - owning that life is nothing but obstacles, and having the good life is about getting good at wanting to overcome them. Not always actually overcoming them, maybe, but living with a fire that always wants to.

Bring on that next obstacle - you're all mine.

I loved the format of yesterday's race. 5 mile loops all day long. There was an opportunity at the end of each loop to call it a day. And there was also an opportunity to ask, what is my story? What ending do I want to write to my story today?

Will it be I grew weary of the obstacles? Or will it be each time I had a chance to attack one more obstacle, I attacked it.

5 times yesterday I got to choose what story I wanted to write in life. No, I didn't get to write the story of how my life ends, I didn't get to write a happily ever after, but I did get to write the story of how I live my life.

And 5 times, the man in this picture. He loved my story. And really, looking at this picture, I think he kind of liked the ending I wrote yesterday as well.

So I'll keep running. I'll keep looking for obstacles. I'll keep writing. And who knows, maybe that actually is the secret to one day writing happily ever after.