Showing Up

I’ve hit a plateau running.

When I first started running again this spring for the first in years, each time I went out I was shaving fifteen or twenty seconds off my previous best time for the same route. As my legs adapted to getting in the rhythm again, I saw noticeable improvement day by day. It was exciting. Motivating even. Each time I returned home huffing and puffing I had a burst of euphoria when I checked my time and saw much I had improved over the last time I had run that route.

I’m no longer cutting seconds off my time each time I go out. In fact I’m not even sure when the last time was that I lowered my best time. Truth be told, more often than not these days, my running times are increasing rather than decreasing. And it seems to be harder sometimes to get up the hills. I’ve plateaued. And if I’m honest, I’m actually rather shocked that I’ve plateaued at close to a full minute per mile slower pace than I was running just ten or fifteen years ago.

Maybe, I tell myself, if I press through this wall, I’ll start lowering my time again. Maybe if I start running more often—or maybe less often?—I’ll start seeing clear improvement again.

But maybe, Elizabeth told me last week as I noted yet again that that day’s run hadn’t been my best time, running isn’t about results as much as it is about just showing up. “It’s like fishing,” she said. “The point isn’t so much actually catching fish as it is simply being there. On a lake. In nature. Fishing.”

One of my better fishing outings...

When we were first dating, Elizabeth graciously joined me on some fishing adventures. I’m not, however, a particularly good fisherperson—I just enjoy being outside fishing. It doesn’t matter to me so much whether we catch anything or not. And the first few times Elizabeth joined me, we seemed to have particularly bad luck. Elizabeth tactfully tried to ask why I even bothered, and I explained to her that the point of fishing was not actually catching fish.

The point of running, at least at this point in my life, is not about seeing clear results. It’s not about being fast. Or seeing clear improvement each and every day. Or feeling stronger as I go. It’s about being faithful. Showing up. Doing it—whether I feel like it or not. Because it’s good for me—whether I see it clearly or not.

Elizabeth and I often say the same thing about the spiritual life. At times, prayer can be electric—you can feel connected with God. But other times it feels empty. Sometimes like God isn’t there. Likewise reading Scripture can be transformative, especially when we have a new insight into a difficult passage or finally make sense of something that’s bothered us for a long time. But other times, reading Scripture can feel like going through the motions. It can get familiar and feel stale. And other spiritual practices can feel the same way—they sometimes feel like a burden or a chore, rather than something we’re eager to do.

But the spiritual life is not always about seeing results—especially clear and noticeable results. Those results are good, and they’re exciting when they do happen, but the spiritual life is more about just showing up. Being faithful. Doing it, even when we don’t feel like doing it. It’s those times that prayer shapes us the most. Those times that reading Scripture shapes us, even if we don’t see it at the time.