New Book Review: "Running Toward Life"

New book review for Running Toward Life: Finding Community and Wisdom in the Distances We Run, by John Trent, Broad Book Press, 2023:

Copy provided by Amazon.

Trent mentions in his introduction that his hope in writing this book is to speak to various phases of one's running life, so that readers will walk away with a similar sense of understanding as to who they are and what is important to them. These phases, which correspond to the three parts of this book, are "Finding Your Mentors", "Choosing Your Companions", and "Overcoming Your Challenges". He goes on to explain that "although these stories are highly personal, they contain some of the larger truths that we all experience in our lives. That we are constantly learning and evolving. That as time passes and we accrue thousands of hard-earned miles on the trails, there are important lessons that are equally hard-earned and can stick with us if we allow them to live on. And that as we gain these experiences, we come to view them more like a way station and not a final destination, where we have the opportunity to continually ask ourselves important questions that help us grow and learn. No matter what distance of ultra we run, we come to understand that whenever we go the distance, it isn't just the number of miles that we have run that matter. As I found out in 1995, you can run an ultra distance that comes on the periphery of something larger and it may not ever be remembered – except by you. Running ultras is a way of running toward what matters most: understanding and finding a greater meaning in life that we live. It helps us run toward our lives."

The closing paragraph of chapter 11 ("Your Days Are Short Here"), which is the last chapter of the "Overcoming Your Challenges" part of this book, echoes the title, but it seems the last sentence quoted above interprets "life" differently. "The dreams we possess we don't ever actually own. If they are to be true dreams, dreams that matter, we must share them with others. Whenever we do, the races that we run will never seem as long. Whenever we do, we guarantee that we are always running toward something that truly matters. Whenever we run, we should always run toward life." Running toward life implies that life exists outside oneself, because running wouldn't be needed if it exists within. As such, this means something spiritual to me. In contrast, Trent's earlier discussion didn't mention running toward life, but toward one's own life. In my view, it makes more sense for a given human being to strive for something they don't already possess. For example, 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 puts it this way: "Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."

That said, I like that Trent discusses ultra running so eloquently as a social activity that brings people together to accomplish a goal. The goal he discusses seems to be actually summarized best in the subtitle of this book: "Finding Community and Wisdom in the Distances We Run." However, this is elaborated upon a bit better in chapter 7 ("The Truths of Wasatch"): "As runners, we start out chasing the things we wish to conquer – time and distance. We wish to run as fast as we can, for as long as we can. Even if we slow, and time becomes less of a motivator, covering the sheer ultra marathon distances remain our primary intoxicant. As I've grown older, and as my body has told me in no uncertain terms that it is acutely aware of what I am trying to do to it, the allure has been less about time and distance and more about every human's wish to remain connected with other people." Trent later recalls a book he read by Roger Angell called "This Old Man", which he considers a deeply moving look at growing old. "He wrote of our basic need as we get older to know that as we live, we always crave companionship to make it come to life: 'Getting old is the second-biggest surprise of my life, but the first, by a mile, is our unceasing need for deep attachment and intimate love.' "

As a lifelong runner who started as a student athlete and continues to run on a daily basis, running hasn't been much of a social activity for me because I almost always run alone. While I initially ran alongside other student athletes over a ten year time period, apart from the relay races I ran my times were always recorded for me as an individual. Ultra racing typically works the same way, but much of what Trent shares in this book is the camaraderie that forms between individuals as they run long distances, and this is largely a foreign concept for me because even when training for the marathon one year I found that I'm not well suited for lengthy conversations while running. I mentioned in my review of a book by Vanessa Zuisei Goddard called "Still Running: The Art of Meditation in Motion" that "I personally use a mantra as the point of focus while running, and when I do this I am actually doing so to zone out…In fact, I've often commented to others that time seemingly passes by much more quickly when I do this. Now, thinking back to my beginnings as a runner in grade school, I was explicitly coached to focus on my breathing. However, once I got this down I found it distracting to be consciously aware of my breathing, so over time removed this practice from my repertoire." As someone inexperienced with ultra running, talking would seem to be exceedingly more distracting than paying attention to my own breathing. I don't race as an adult because I got burned out as a student athlete, but in retrospect the contrast is clear: my races were largely selfish, and with the right intent one could arguably reword the title of this book from "Running Toward Life" to "Running Toward Selflessness".