The 25th Annual Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon weekend will be happening soon. The three-day weekend through October 1st is a festival of fitness and life. It includes lots of activities for children, fat people, fit people and the truly athletic among us – runners who can cover 26 miles of city streets without dropping down dead at the finish line. Now, to the casual viewer watching the six o’clock local news, or thumbing through the Star Tribune, one could easily overlook this annual event as another local happening that marks the changing seasons, feeding the human-interest stories local news media needs to balance the reports of mothers cradling dead babies in places far, far away. The Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon is a call to the community to participate in the beauty of being a community. It is both a celebration of life and metaphor for business.
One of my earliest memories growing up in England was having my first-grade teacher explain the meaning of the inscription on the back of the old three penny coin which read, in “Ich Dien.” It means “I Serve.” It’s funny how that two word motto and two-minute lesson in character has stuck with me all these years. To this day I often reflect on the fact that such lofty concepts are inscribed on our money, like in “In God We Trust” in the U.S. Another marvelous lesson in character was learned considering the dedication to duty that must have inspired that poor bastard Pheidippides to run back-to-back marathons to deliver the news “Rejoice, we conquer!” before collapsing on the marble steps, dead from exhaustion. Like a good recruiter, hot on his heels, always going the extra mile.
Running the long race, community, service and dedication are hallmarks of a special kind of leader. Like Jesus washing the feet of his disciples, the humility of leadership contrasts with hubris – played out like some Greek tragedy – the arrogance of power. Like my beloved Mahatmaji, leaders do not always appear in Armani suits and swagger with pride. And like exemplary business leaders – Bill George, former Chair & CEO of Medtronic, for example – they often go unnoticed but for their actions and fostering of community.
For some, running a marathon is routine. For others it’s a quest. Like leadership, it a race that requires more than speed – it requires those things that matter most: training, conditioning, endurance, stamina, desire and vision. Some are competing against the next guy, others are competing against their personal best. But what makes a marathon run so interesting for us is that it requires the one thing that distinguishes run-of-the-mill leaders from those who are prepared to step up and serve – faith. Starting a business, like Nerd Search I imagine, requires those things that give marathon runners juice. Being actively involved in one’s community, giving back to take a few steps forward, is that a mark of leadership, or something else?
It’s true, the Greeks have produced some noteworthy leaders, exceptional runners. Dean Karnazes, like Forrest Gump, started running and kept on going. This fall, the 43-year-old long distance runner will tackle one marathon a day for 50 consecutive days, running a total 1,310 miles in 50 days – The Endurance 50. Clearly, this type of extreme behavior is driven by something extraordinary, obsessive even. Or maybe it is something else, something noble? Who knows? It’s all Greek to me.
Yep, it may be Greek, or Spanish or whatever. We do it (marathons, Mds [Marathon des Sables - google for it!], mountain marathons etc) because we can, because something pushes us to test ourselves against me, you, him, it…..
Once you’re in, only injury keeps you away - and being away is the real pain!!
It’s an interesting subject - this “fire in the belly”, this “unquechable thirst”. Is it a birthright it or is it learned? Is it character or characteristic or are they the same? I cotton to the birth explanation - you?
Maureen Sharib
Telephone Names Sourcer
TechTrak
513 899 9628
That is an interesting question, Maureen. It reminds me of a lesson I once learned about the difference between aptitude testing and skills assessment. I have the aptitude to run a marathon but if I tried I fear would not get beyond the mailbox!
Amitai Givertz
Advertising Department
Are-U-Monetizing-My-Blog-Or-What, Inc.
513 899 9628
Yep, Amitai, I monetize everything I can get my mitts on! How else r they gonna’ know who ta’ call?
Maureen Sharib
Telephone Names Sourcer
TechTrak
513 899 9628
It is the unquenchable thirst to exceed what was before. “What was before” can be the last accomplishment, a personal best or the record set by another. It is not for the sake of shaming another. It is simply because there is a mountain before us that holds the view of a new field that may be of interest, may hold even more reward than the last. And we know that if we merely sit idly in the current place, we will never know the possibilities. The possibilities are so immense.
Pressing on in spite of adversity may seem like an heroic thing to do, or it may seem the most foolish. It depends on one’s perspective. It depends on what the negative odds are. Having trained for the 1990 marathon while also running for elected office, I truly know that attempting 50 back-to-back marathons with no break for the sake of our body’s recovery is tantamount to suicide.
Likewise, that proposed 32-week blog swap could have been something very wonderful. Unfortunately, pettiness, gossip, vanity, avarice, jealousy got in the way. Thinking less of others belittled not only those despised but the results of what could have been. Trying to strive through a full eight months of that type of insanity — complete with boycotting sites — is the same as running a 50-day continuous marathon.
But back to the nature of one who presses on in spite of certain odds, who competes in order to attain, the leader who strives to move forward and bring their group with them to greater fulfillment, it is part birthright, it is partly taught, it is partly learned from trial and fulfillment.
Why rob society of those types of people? Why despise them? We should not. Actually, we should aspire to do likewise and not consider whether we have an impairment that will cause us to fail. Actually, we should only take note of when our own bodies give us warning signals to do an interval. Take the interval and when we’ve regained our wind, go back to the pace and the venture. It’s necessary. Otherwise, there is waste, decay, sloth, a state of misery.
Damn those who feel they can not and then get in the way of others who are willing to make the effort. Damn them for being less than they could be and for making society that much less. Damn them for taking us back to the pre-historic ages of paltry and meagerness.
Yes, those who press forward are admirable for the fact that they have the courage to do so. But they do not do things in order to cause admiration from others. They do because they realize “it” must be done and because they believe it can be done and because they believe they can do it, in some way and to some degree. Their detractors? Sometimes they are beneficial because the detractors test the strength and endurance and force increased resourcefulness, richer attainment.
Wow! What a simply fantastic comment. Thank you, thank you, thank you.