“Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.”
Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
Murakami goes on:
“Say you’re running and you think, ‘Man, this hurts, I can’t take it anymore.’ The ‘hurt’ part is an unavoidable reality, but whether or not you can stand anymore is up to the runner himself.”
And now I’m rethinking every time I ever thought I’d reached my limit. Whose limit? Turns out it was nobody but me all along.
Damn.
Linda hosts One-Liner Wednesday. Check out her blog to see who else is participating this week.
Riddle from the Middle 
Ah. I don’t run much. I hate running if I’m running just to run. It feels unpleasant. lol
I live with runners. I’m supportive. That is pleasant.
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I have zero understanding for the running. Runners look so happy when they talk about it. Keep bringing up that runner’s high and I’m like yeah, right, all the goodness, except you have to get through pain and suffering and holy crap I’m gonna die to get there. Don’t have it in me. Nope.
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I wonder if they have tasted ice cream. Ice cream is straight on euphoria.
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Love Haruki Murakami! ❤
By the way, your pingback didn't work because you linked to the whole category instead of the individual post. 🙂
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I’m enjoying his quotes, too. Thanks, Linda. I’ve had the hardest time linking that particular post! I link my scheduled post to the permalink but on Wednesday mornings I update the link in my post to connect to your current week’s entry. Usually that produces a pingback but not this week. Guess there isn’t a way to link until you’ve published your own…?
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Yep, you have to have an actual post to ping back to, unfortunately. I schedule my Wednesday posts to appear at 2am my time every Wednesday.
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I guess if your definition of “suffering” is getting all emotional about your pain, then it’s optional. If your definition of “suffering” is being harmed by the pain, then it isn’t always optional. Just my contrarian two cents’ worth.
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I suppose a lot of it is in the definition. Much of my suffering has come from me taking in my problems & compounding the pain. That’s been on me.
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I do get that. I often have to school myself to reject the “sorry for myself” component of pain. Which, you know, doesn’t make it really less painful.
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Suffering is optional…
We choose that option far too often. I hope you can leave it behind, though, the next time you have a choice.
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I know I’ve chosen it often over the years. I’m doing better these days. When I forget I usually catch myself, and that’s half the battle right there.
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That is so important to understand.
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And not a lesson I was ready to learn until lately, I think.
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This is the stuff that runners think about all the time. Especially during long runs when everything hurts! 🙂
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I can’t even imagine what it would take to take me through even a 5k! (Can you tell I’m not a runner? 😆)
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