Day 4,119—Two Runs Until the Badger 100: Don’t Hold Yourself Back Waiting for the Afterlife—

 

         I watched the pre-race video, started packing, and bought some stuff for the race. I am thinking about what to eat the day before, as I'll be spending the  driving, which makes me think I might just snack during the car ride. I could buy a sandwich from the Vegan Deli to have on Friday. So many decisions and how much do they matter?

         I bought some bug spray and some more Vaseline, but I wondered if I would end up needing it. What will I need for this race? I started visualizing it after watching some race videos yesterday. I watched two. One that had only visuals from the race, and a different one that had a guy talking about the race as he cut back to footage of him running. I liked the second one better because he told his story, even if maybe he wasn’t proud of all of it.

         I liked the part about how much he wanted to give up because of some medical reasons, but his wife told him she didn’t come all this way for him to not finish. He refers to himself as the Old Ultra Runner. I don’t have such a concise moniker. Maybe I should start calling myself the Vegan Ultra Streak Runner, or VUSR for short? That doesn’t have the same ring to it. I am going to go to the pool with Vivian now, but I plan to get back to packing for this race soon.

         I was thinking a lot about how some people use the belief in an afterlife as a reason not to do something now. Why stand up for yourself and do what is right if that person will burn in hell in the afterlife, and you will be in heaven? Or so the reasoning goes. Why go after the things you want in this life if the worst thing that can happen is that you will die and go to heaven? It is a crazy way to look at the present as some kind of holding cell until eternity begins in the afterlife. At one time, I felt like it was encouraging. It was a positive take on some of life’s bleakest moments, but now I just see it being used as an excuse for not doing what matters now. It might not always be harmful to believe in something like an afterlife, but it is when you use that belief to hold you back from doing what is right, now.