Running for Perspective - Madoff, Cramer, Stewart

In a week featuring swindler Bernie Madoff, a somewhat sane Jim Cramer, and a sobering and serious Jon Stewart, I found my running a good place to discover my own reality. My runs, well not all but some, had this sort of guy-standing-sedately-as-a-tornado-chaotically-swirled-around-him feel to it. Kind of like some of those Zack Braff scenes from the movie "Garden State"--like when the airplane experiences turbulence, people go crazy, and he sits mildly, staring blankly.

Some of the runs I do are boring, a struggle to just keep performing the act. These didn't have that feel. No performance and no act. Instead, they felt like an escape to normalcy, where the legs just move and the arms sway and the last thing I'm thinking about is what I'm doing.

My decisions to run this week were instinctive and the time spent was alone, as if I am someone famous and had to have my "Justin Time." On a side note, whenever someone places their name followed by the word "Time," there is a decent chance he or she may take themselves way too serious (or at the very least, publish a blog).

Occasionally, my mind slipped into the week's top news events. On Friday's run, I recalled the Stewart-Cramer interview. I'm usually not defensive of people who screw others for personal gain, which was Stewart's overt inference to Cramer. Still, I couldn't help but feel a little remorse for Cramer. My feelings dissipated, both at the time I watched the berating and in retrospect at effortless mile 4 when I thought about one line, "This is not a fucking game."
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Stewart_to_Cramer_Its_not_fking_0313.html

Immediately, my mind recalled the American traditionalists who I know. My grandfather--the long-time Ford employee; two of my friends--Merrill Lynch employees; my dad--a banker...people who put much of their stock, both personally and financially, in security. All of them suffering in one way or another from a massive financial storm that occurred in a blink, and without warning. Like the aforementioned tornado.

"So what now," I thought, as a light sweat maintained itself somewhere around mile 6. The truth of the matter is I don't feel like someone who truly knows much about the economy or the collapse itself. I'm just now starting to figure out how to manage my own money (albeit, I am a bit of an entrepreneur).

On Saturday's run, a relatively short 4.7 miler (that's a pretty good estimate) with nearly perfect Santa Monica weather, the running conversation (pun intended) arose yet again in my head. This time I came to, not an answer, but a resolution. Having not looked up the actual definition of an answer or a resolution, I decided an answer means that one feels absolutely right when they come up with an "answer." When one "resolves," however, the absolutism isn't there. In my head, when I resolve, it's like this is what I'm choosing to believe or this is what I'm going to do, whether it is right or wrong this is the best I can come up with.

I resolved in the "value of work." Another phrase brought up by Stewart, I resolved that "the value of work" trumps it all. With all the visions of vanity that lead us to fast money, quick cars, the country club life, and whatever else that may be over the rainbow, the value of work in the least, seems to just make sense. Find something you have passion for, then you'll work really hard at it, and the money will come because you're producing a high-quality product that people will pay good money for. And when the money comes, and it will, you'll have a better idea of what to do with it since you knew what you had to do to get it. Pretty simple.

The sport of running itself is simple. But it's not easy. What gets you furthest in running? Running. Not breathing techniques, stretch routines, plyometrics, training techniques. Those things make a difference, and sometimes a significant difference. But simply running. That's what gets you the furthest in running. Logging miles. Putting in the time and effort. Working. And so to it is our job, our relationships, our passions.

Off to run to a clear day and a clearer mind.

Good Song Coming to Mind: "Keep It Loose, Keep It Light," Amos Lee
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmQFwIKsU1U

Justin