Awhile back I bought my husband the book The Inner Game of Tennis. I cracked it open the other day and had an epiphany. Rather than try to explain it, here is the reason in black and white why I pursue endurance sports:

“What do you really want?” The answer was quite unexpected. What I really wanted, I realized….I wanted to win the inner game.

Having come to this realization, knowing what I really wanted, I walked to my match with a new sense of enthusiasm. In the first game, I double-faulted three times and lost my serve, but from then on I felt a new certainty. It was as if a huge pressure had been relieved, and I was out there playing with all the energies at my command. As it worked out, I was never able to break my opponent’s spinning, left-handed serve, but I didn’t lose my own serve again until the last game in the second set. I had lot 6-4, 6-4, but I walked off the court feeling that I had won. I had lost the external game, but had won the game I had wanted to, my own game, and I felt very happy. Indeed, when a friend came up to me after the match and asked how I’d done, I was tempted to say, “I won!”

For the first time I recognized the existence of the Inner Game, and its importance to me. I didn’t know what the rules of the game were, nor exactly what its aim was, but I did sense that it involved something more than winning trophy.”

That’s how I feel every time I cross a finish line….like I won! And we do win…we win a battle against ourselves. There’s no stronger competition than your own head….