I constantly struggle with rationalizing the concept of turning back the clock with always forward. They cannot successfully coexist, which leads me to a more kernel understanding of aging gracefully. Here are the facts: I’m not going to run a 4.3 forty ever again. I’m not going to be a marathon man ever at all. However, I can see myself in a 5k. I can see myself running a 5.3 forty (heck, Rich Eisen ran a 6.22 at 53 nd he’s not all that athletic looking). I can rationalize growing old and growing into a shape and athleticism that fits being a man in his late forties. I need that. I need to find a way to move forward into who I want to become and not have to abandon the idea of who I was and who I wanted to be. All of those ‘selves’ are stages of life and are impacted by the life that happens across those stages. How many of us actually have the benefit of becoming precisely who we thought we would be. Moreover, how many of us have the ability to roll back to the person we believed we were at the time. Hindsight provides perspective that being in the moment and moving towards the moment never could.
Today I walked alongside the Sumida river thinking about these things and thinking that never once in my life did I think I’d be walking along the Sumida river. Yet here I am, and here I am walking at five in the morning because walking is what I do every morning. Growth is a journey, and I appreciate being on it.
Some Thoughts:
- Never try to blog after a 12 hr flight… You saw the results.