Perseverance in Pain...

The first Olympics I remember watching as a child was the 1984 Summer Games in Los Angeles. Now, I didn't know any better as a young lad, but I was happy about those nasty no-good Russians not participating and the Memorial Coliseum being filled with the red, white and blue. The first race I happened to watch on TV was the 3000 meters final, and there was apparently a lot of hype behind it. The two major competitors were Great Britain's Zola Budd and the darling of the USA team Mary Decker. What happened next was and still is a controversy that will be discussed for decades...

What I remember next (other than my mother repeatedly shouting out "She tripped her!") was watching the emotion of tears streaming down Decker's face as she watched her dream of Olympic Gold go down onto the stadium track. I just remember feeling a sense of disappointment along with her, and every time I would watch a runner lose a race, regardless of magnitude, that same feeling would come back. Perhaps it was because it is a display of how fleeting victory can be, and that years of hard work would disappear in a moment's notice. However, that paled in comparison to what took place at the Big Sky Outdoor Conference Championships last week.

Granted, she had already qualified for the finals, but instead of taking the easy way out and sitting down after rupturing her Achilles right after the race started, her decision wasn't even a debatable one: to keep on racing. She realized it wasn't just about her pain in the moment, it was about something larger. We often allow the slightest of annoyances to throw us off the goal, but remember, it's not just for our own interests that we have to continue on. There are others that are counting on us, looking at us to see if we have what it takes to finish the task. As someone who left college 15 years ago, only to return in my late 30s, I had to come to a realization: that it's not about what I wanted to accomplish, but to let future generations know that when life knocks you down, you have to get back up.

Erdahl, like so many others before her, got knocked down, but never quit. If you live long enough you will get knocked down too, and pain will be in the process. However, allow that pain to help you to grow, fight through it, and keep your eyes on the prize ahead. It will come in due time.