We have to find some way to get excited about all of the repetition. And to actually find reasons to love the moments that seem usual and mundane to most everybody watching. The moments when we’re warming up at the start, and when we’re visualizing the course, or putting on our race bibs, or getting each other pumped up before we go. If we don’t get that excited feeling, we have no real reason to try. I can’t only care about winning. If that was the case, I wouldn’t be doing this. I have to care about ALL of it. Every single moment, of every single day. Even the moments that are filled with nerves and pressure.
Even the moments when the stakes are high. Even the moments when my failure is on display for the world to see. In the moments that are the most uncomfortable when I wish I could stop caring because caring just hurts…that’s when I have to dive deeper into it. I have to not shy away from it. I have to let that moment be vibrant and glorious and uncomfortable. I have to play with that feeling, and be alive with that feeling…race with it and race for it.
It’s not the winning that gets me psyched up—maybe that’s why my finish celebrations tend to be so insanely blah. It’s the moments before winning, and the moments just after…when I see my teammates, and my family in the finish…when I see their reactions. Then I have some tangible emotion to tie the win to…then it becomes special. The moment when I cross the finish line with the green light is not a memory at all. But everything else during the day, that’s where the memories are made.
My brother and my sister-in-law, and one of my closest family friends, came all the way to Sweden from Colorado to surprise me on the day of 87. I had NO idea for the entire race, and the moment I saw them in the finish I just freaked out. I called them to come out to the finish with me, and the FIS race coordinator was running behind him yelling, ‘You’re not allowed to be there!’ Those are the moments I’m talking about that make the work and the win and the memories TRULY unforgettable.
I hope you all enjoy this episode. Thank you so much for following along…I can’t thank you all enough.
Love, Miki
