Small steps to a bright future
Medal of Honor recipient Kyle Carpenter captured my attention and my heart in a favorite podcast of mine when he said, “the smallest of steps lead to the grandest of journeys.” He is an extraordinary human being who exemplifies service to others. That statement is not only inspiring, it is verifiably true. There are evidence-based practices that tell us creating habits that last is best done by taking small steps over time. Check out James Clear’s Atomic Habits if you need the science. Everything about that first triathlon nearly 22 years ago was a “small step.” Bike racks gathered from the city parks, clipart “borrowed” from the internet for the t-shirts, computer geniuses trying to figure out how to time it and a $100 borrowed from a triathlete so I could “snail mail” paper entry forms. Small steps in a forward direction. I think of each of our 17 fitness events as a small step that leads our athletes in the direction of a grander way to live. I am looking toward 2023 with service and Kyle’s words in mind.
A new year seems an appropriate time to look at what service to others means. For me, it means taking stock of the Platte River Fitness Series and what I can do with it to better serve its community. As I reflect on 21 years, there seems to be a central theme to them. I joked to my friend Allison in that first year, “It would appear that I am building the plane as it flies.” I had no real idea about how to do any of it, which actually may have been an advantage. Without preconceived ideas, the PRFS could change and shape-shift to meet the needs of the people it was meant to serve. It has and continues to be a “work in progress” because we are all “works in progress.” People trying to live their best lives are always “becoming” and like our athletes, the PRFS is ever-evolving. I am certain I have evolved as much as it has. I never imagined it would be anything other than a short-term initiative that lasted a couple of years. That is what I surely thought I was signing up for. We would host a few races and that would be the extent of its service. Clearly, I was wrong. Longevity would be the first phase of its evolution. In life and in initiatives, however, longevity is best paired with quality over quantity.
The second phase of evolution was the way non-profit organizations came from everywhere, it seemed, to embrace the idea that local races not only helped people get fit, they could also be a solid way to raise awareness about their work and maybe even raise a few dollars for their cause. We had as many as 29 races in one calendar year…local, home-grown races in small town Nebraska. That kind of “enthusiasm windfall” was challenging, and I remember being very tired that year. Maybe not sustainable over time, but incredible, none-the-less! Organizations came in all forms, with dedicated people serving both community health and wellness and the causes dear to them. We seem to have found our “sweet spot.” We’ve held steady at 15-18 races for a while now. We kept the idea of a virtual challenge for January and February following the COVID year, the upside of a very rough time for everyone. (Race directors “evolved” to decide that live races in January and February in western Nebraska were not all that fun to host. Strangely, those old January and February races were often some of the largest of the year! Cold is always better when you’re moving than when you are volunteering!) What continues to fill me with gratitude is the number of races that are 10-15 years old or more. Race directors may change here and there, but the longevity of most of our lineup is what gives the PRFS such a strong foundation.
There’s been the evolution from “sponsor” to “partner.” It was thrilling when businesses said “yes” to sponsorship that first year. I had never asked people for money before. I had to get out of my comfort zone to be sure. It was and continues to be exciting to welcome a new sponsor to either the PRFS or one of its member races. It feels more and more like community collaboration for the greater good. Even competitors work together in service to others. There are those, however, who have said “yes” for decades-from the very first year, those who have become true and trusted partners, with Great Plains Health and NebraskaLand Bank being our longest serving partnerships.
We’ve evolved from an initiative focused solely of physical fitness and physical health to one that is determined to move the idea of “whole human health” forward. It is hard to put words around the slow progression from “fitness” to “whole human health” even though I watched it take place, both in me and in the initiative I founded. There is so much more to us than physical health and its very definition has changed over time. We know that “fitness” doesn’t have a size and that healthy people come in every shape. We have always embraced that. No one had to “earn” the right to our starting line by looking a certain way or having a certain amount of ability. Everyone has a place at every race. Fostering a sense of belonging at that starting line has always been my greatest ambition. The rest of the world is finally catching up. I started the PRFS with the premise that every human being is an athlete. If we could help an individual identify as an athlete, he or she might adopt the healthy behaviors of an athlete. Even before the pandemic, I became convicted that health is health, and that to be healthy, we need both good physical health and good mental health. As far back as 2007, I knew I wanted to do more than just give people a way to exercise when I wrote our tag line, “Building strong bodies and bold spirits.” The tag line is being retired this year, but even in retirement, it remains true. We have learned so much about neuroscience, brain biology and psychophysiology since that first James O’Rourke Triathlon, and it is revolutionizing what it means to be a healthy human.
The work of the PRFS started in fitness and recreation at the North Platte Rec Center, the place that became “home” to the PRFS and many of its member races. It remains (even as it undergoes its own evolution in the future), our valued foundational partner. As our knowledge about whole human health grew, so did the need for a bigger, broader lens through which we could view our work. Whole human health does not stop with the physical, mental, and spiritual health of an individual. It knows that there is, as Martin Luther King once said, an” inescapable structure of reality” that connects us to each other. Human beings are hardwired for connection, and it is in community that we experience our fullest measure of health. Connection doesn’t just feed our souls; it feeds our bodies in measurable ways. Connection to others regulates our heart rates and respiratory rates. We heal more quickly from injury or illness because our immune system is better activated. In their work on stress, Emily and Amelia Nagoski report that science has shown that when engaged in “intense effort to achieve a shared goal (a.k.a. a race) for those moments we step onto a neurological bridge and the barrier between us and other people dissolves.” We become a community, or as our athletes like to call it, “a fitness family.” You all knew before the science told us why there was just “something about a race.” This bridge is nowhere better displayed than at a PRFS event when athletes who’ve spent themselves in their own race, take a deep breath and immediately go back to encourage another athlete in their pursuit of the finish line. In recent years, the clear and wide lens through which to see the work of whole human health has shown itself to be in public health. Public health takes the broadest and most inclusive view of what it means to be a healthy individual living in a healthy community. Public health opened its arms to the PRFS through the doors of the West Central District Health Department. It is a perfect place for the PRFS to belong because the work of the community isn’t done by just one person, organization or entity, the PRFS is the work of all of us.
Those that serve the initiative designed to serve others have evolved. Again, there is this amazing throughline of longevity. Many race directors have served in their role for a decade or more. Many races have the same volunteers who show up every year. There are organizations that volunteer year after year, like the softball team from NPCC and the staff of the North Platte Rec Center. The faces may change, but the organizations’ support endures. And of course, there is this group of amazing people, who came along at different times over the years, maybe as an individual race volunteer or an athlete. They formed a volunteer team that answers the call to serve all year long. Alyssa Fabik, Nelson Jett, Gerry and Sharen Berglund and Doris Davis, a team of people I simply cannot do without and who lift-up the PRFS with the strength of their dedication and the goodness of their hearts.
It is very possible that the biggest change over 21 years has been in me. For much of my life, I’ve seen many things as binary, black or white, this or that. I enjoyed running as a solitary activity, so that must mean I wouldn’t enjoy it in a group. This or that. I was wrong. I like solitary running AND running with a group. I had to be a certain size, shape or speed or I wasn’t an athlete. Age has a gorgeous way of making me see that I can be slower with more aches and pains AND I can still be an athlete. Run, never walk, or I wasn’t a “real runner.” Now I have no choice but to walk AND run, and even when it becomes just walk, I am still a runner and I love to help people see themselves the same way. I desperately didn’t want this need for connection to be true. Let’s have some races, hand out some medals and consider that to be our service. Truth is, the Platte River Fitness Series has always been about individual accomplishment AND connection. Individuals creating a community. I had young children at home when the PRFS began. Those young children are now adults in careers with young children of their own. I retired from one career and started another. I had less gray hair, better hearing, and a lot less wrinkles…AND I am continuing to adapt as an athlete, as a person and as the leader of this organization. The PRFS’s greatest lesson for me so far has been that life is more “both/and” than it is “this or that.” The “plane” is still flying AND it is still being built. Like Kyle Carpenter, we take small steps AND share a grand journey, as individuals AND as a family.