The Climb

Me in Jasper in 2006

I didn't know I liked any Miley Cyrus songs. I haven't followed the charts since I was a teenager. I usually turn on the radio and listen to whatever comes on, and if I don't like it, I turn it off. My commute hasn't been longer than 10 minutes for nearly ten years, so really, music artists only get 20 minutes out of my day (on a good day) to get my attention.

So, last night, driving home after a long day, I hear this song come on. I've heard it before, just background noise on my drive to or from work... but the first time, I listen to it. And it puts tears in my eyes, because I'm supposed to be running 21km  (13.1 miles) on Sunday: the longest I've ever run. And I thought about how I used to weigh over 300 pounds, how it used to be hard to go up and down stairs, how it all started with just spending 30 minutes less on the couch each day... and how changing my habits meant I could give my mom a kidney without any repercussions to my own health.

And all this training: It's probably the second hardest thing I've ever done (after giving someone a kidney). It has been a lot of work. It's taken a lot of focus, and a lot of commitment to make sure I eat properly, sleep enough, stretch enough, relax enough. It's forced me to stay right in the moment at all times, because when you're running for over two hours, if you start panicking in the first 20 minutes, you're screwed. And I've dealt with pain: pain while running, and the pain of admitting that I was injured and had to stop for a couple of weeks. And then the fear of failing: I've sat in tears some mornings, trying to convince myself that I can do this, and that I can't let all these people who have supported me down by giving up.

I've learned that I can't rely on anyone else to keep me going but me. And this is not the only difficult thing I will ever have to do in life. And yeah, maybe it's not important to anyone else in the grand scheme of things, but it's made me a different person in a short period of time. Maybe I know how to do these hard things just a little bit better now.

So, before she started swinging on wrecking balls, Miley said a few things that actually mean something to me. Heh. Who knew?

There's always gonna be another mountain
I'm always gonna wanna make it move
Always gonna be an uphill battle
Sometimes I'm gonna have to lose
Ain't about how fast I get there
Ain't about what's waitin' on the other side
It's the climb...