Running is a lot like growing up.

It took me years to want it and to realize it was what I needed. You see, running starts off as an ideal, like being a grown-up.

It’s good for you, you know. It helps you breathe. It helps you live.

Growing up isn’t easy. Before you do, it’s like lounging on the couch, begging the nagging feeling to go away.

But your life doesn’t give up on you, and neither do your muscles, or your mind.

They call you to more, they’ll call you to run and to exercise every part of you.

You can feel it, can’t you? The muscles straining as you climb up the Administration Building’s stairs, your thoughts pleading with you to challenge yourself with a tougher curriculum.

For me, the first mile is the worst. No part of me wants to continue. My eyes blur and my breath feels like a mixture of fire and ice in my throat.

Getting your foot in the door is like that too. Learning how to grow up and manage things. Accepting responsibility and taking blame. It is by no means easy.

But, no matter what, it’s important to push through. Because, before you know it, you’re in, you’re past the second mile marker.

Responsibilities come, they store up and leap at you. Like a stitch in your side, they’ll slow your stride but that is no reason to stop.

If you do, they’ll overwhelm you. They’ll stop you halfway through and leave you gasping for breath, stretching your sides and batting away disappointment.

Everyone starts somewhere. Each person experiences their own pain, their own limitations to growing up, but no one has to stop short.

We are capable of so much. Our bodies were designed to be strong, to carry us through this life. All we have to do is believe in them, believe in the process, believe in ourselves.

Keep running, power through and create yourself.

Because you’ll never be more than you are at this moment if you don’t get up and allow yourself to grow, to break that mold around you. To stretch it, to bend it.

If there’s one thing about running and growing up, it’s that you keep learning, you keep teaching yourself.

After all, we’re all just training to be more, to be infinitely more, than what we are today.

So good luck, get going and don’t forget to trust yourself.