The encouraging words of Nelson Mandela “It always seems impossible until it’s done”, hung on my wall until the day of my half marathon. It was finally the time that four months of training would finally pay off.
I woke that morning with both excited and nervous butterflies in my stomach. Question after question, “Will I even finish?”, “What will my time be?”, “Will my legs cramp?”, spun through my head. I was mostly afraid I wasn’t going to finish before my goal time of two hours. To me if I couldn’t do that, then what was to show of all the hard work I had put in over these past few months?
Ten minutes before the race was about to start I was standing in my corral surrounded by 38,000 other people. Chills ran up my back. Here I was, about to accomplish something that for so long I told myself I couldn’t do, not only would I be stride in stride with an amazing friend but also 38,000 other amazing people. Everyone there was running for a cause and achieving their own goals. Once I started running it became clear to me that I could do this. During mile one I ran behind a man in the Army running with two prosthetic legs, and here I was telling myself “I hope I finish”. It was right then I knew I would finish, it no longer matter how long it took me to do it, finishing was finishing in my book. And no matter what my time was, I would be proud of myself. Up until mile eight was fairly “easy”, our pace was good and my body wasn’t tired yet. It was around mile nine when I started thinking “Ok, this needs to be over with”. It was painful to believe I still had five more miles to go. I reminded myself not to stop and to keep going. The constant encouragement of bystanders, the enthusiastic runners and those running as a St. Jude Hero were all the reasons I was able to finish the last five miles.
Crossing the finish line was a moment I will never forget. I did it. I can now say I accomplished something that at one point was something I deemed impossible.
Now, I know nothing is impossible.
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