The Meaning Is Often Deeper Than You Think

​If the secret to life is indeed tied to depth—and I've come to believe more and more that it is—it explains a lot about some of the struggles in my life.

This week, I listened to a podcast that felt like a fantasy come to life. Rich Roll, whose book Finding Ultra inspired my desire to see how far I could push my body, interviewed Steven Pressfield, whose The War of Art poured fuel on the fire of my love for writing.

Listening to these two men talk about overcoming the very real and intimidating forces of resistance in our lives was powerful.

Pressfield said depth is the key to creativity. Acknowledging that Roll is an accomplished endurance athlete, he said the same is true of ultra-fitness—the key is depth.

Pressfield went on to say that anything we do for an hour is much different than if we do it for ten minutes.

I think about that.

I think about how we live in a ten-minute world. A world of shortcuts and surface-level exchanges. A world that rewards speed over substance. A world where we skim instead of sink deep.

But life’s most beautiful moments don’t happen in the shallows.

I think about my ultra-running experiences. Pressfield is right. I think about running the Georgia Jewel last September. I was out there for 13 ½ hours to cover 37 miles. The most beautiful hour of that experience—the hour where I learned the most about myself, about life—was hour 13. It wasn’t at the start, where I was fresh and eager. It wasn’t even in the middle, when fatigue set in. It was in the deep, when I had to reach beyond what I thought I had.

I think about my writing. Some days I sit here, and after five minutes, I want to quit. The words feel forced, the thoughts scattered. But if I keep going, if I stay in it, something shifts. Words don’t just come from my mind; they come from my soul. Writing gets deep.

I think about my work. My joy doesn’t come from crossing off the superficial tasks on my to-do list but from the deep work—learning, understanding, sharing. My fulfillment isn’t in the mechanics of a job but in the meaning found beneath it, in helping people navigate trauma, substance abuse, and mental health struggles.

And I think about relationships.

I wonder if the secret to a life-giving relationship is not found in a world of quick and endless likes, but in the deep places—face to face, sharing the hardest conversations, the truest stories, the rawest moments. The kind of moments where silence speaks, where tears are exchanged without embarrassment, where laughter echoes because it comes from somewhere real.

I wonder if joy in life comes not from relationships that skim the surface, but from those that plunge to the ocean floor.

And I wonder if my most meaningful connection to God is not found in reading the first chapter of my Bible reading plan this morning, but at the end of a prayer where I have let Him into my deepest wounds—my hurts, my regrets, my fears.

I wonder if my connection to God is strongest not in memorization or in the structured commandments, but in the depths of my soul, where He is not a distant judge but an ever-present love.

I wonder if Pressfield is right. Right about creativity and ultra-fitness, for sure. But more importantly, right about life. That the secret to life is deep.

And I wonder if, like me, many have missed out on that secret. We’ve lived on the surface, afraid to go under, afraid to let life—and people, and God—fully in.

Maybe we all need to resist a little more the temptation to live ten-minute lives when life’s truest meaning is found after an hour.