And in the end…there is love.

Last night, I was running through my neighborhood. It was not a great run. I felt like I was moving through mud, my feet dragging across the sidewalk. In between songs blaring on my iPod, all I could hear was the scuffing of my shoes on the sidewalk and my raspy breathing.

Even my shadow seemed to mock me. My legs looked short and stubby. My form seemed wrong. I could see my phone bulging out of my pocket. Real runners don’t need a phone. They’re not afraid they will pass out. In my other pocket, my inhaler formed a lump against my hip. Real runners can breathe without inhaling misty drops of medicine.

I felt tears prick behind my eyes as I imagined the thoughts of the people driving past me. They were probably laughing at me. At my red face. My creeping shorts. My flailing arms.

What was I doing. I was just a poser. Not really a runner. I was just embarrassing myself.

But then, I remembered a blog I read a few months ago by Kristin Armstrong. Kristin is a runner. A real runner. Worlds away from me. But she said something that resurfaced just as I was ready to throw in the towel.

A surefire way to get picked on is to speak up, act out, try new things, make mistakes, say what you feel, risk, reach out, put it out there, have opinions, ask questions, be deliberate, be hasty, be vulnerable, be real.

An image comes to mind of an overweight person running…red-faced, perspiring, angled shorts surely chafing, slowly working their way around the track. Would any runner, worth the salt on their sweaty face, scoff? Are you kidding me? No way. When I see someone like this, I smile and nod like I do anytime a runner passes by. Except in this case, on the inside I am cheering. Any runner knows how hard it is to begin, to motivate and to fight inertia. Our instinct as runners is to encourage.

And most runners carry this same sentiment even out of the shower and into normal clothes. And that is the gift we share, our offering to the world, especially to those who cannot run a mile (or 3, 6, 13, 26.2) in our shoes, so to speak.

Those words reminded me of a dear friend, another runner. She’s amazing, and sometimes I’m surprised by her encouragement. I always feel like she should be laughing at my feeble attempts at being in shape. But she doesn’t. She cheers me on when I feel like I’ve failed. She speaks life into me. She is one of the reasons I haven’t stopped.

So, last night, I kept running. I didn’t break any land speed records. I continued to plod along, one foot in front of the other until I made it home, soaked in sweat, my head pounding. But as I stood in the shower a few minutes later, I felt just a tiny spark of–what was it–pride? accomplishment?

I’m not ready to give up yet.