Rise
Silencing my worst critic.
At the sound of my alarm, I open my eyes to a darkened hotel room. I stand to turn off the harpsichord chimes and stretch my arms above my head. It’s 4:30am and I have a flight to catch back home, a place where the suburbs of Milwaukee are a stark contrast to the New York City skyline that hums through the sheer hotel curtains. Quickly, the should-have-dones from the day before flood my mind.
I’m in the city for an event; an in-real-life meet up of Robin Arzon’s lifestyle membership club. Robin is an absolute force, and she and I met over a decade ago when she ran 5 marathons in 5 days along Segment 4 in Utah in my nonprofit’s inaugural relay run. She was a force back then too, still finding her way within the fitness space after leaving a successful law career. This was when she had a couple thousand followers on Instagram and 3 years before she was hired as one of Peloton’s first instructors. I too was finding my way, sleeping on a powder-blue couch in a 1994 Ford motorhome, feeding runners bananas and capturing my vision on an old Canon Rebel. A lot has changed for both of us since then, but we’ve remained connected over the years, so when her Swagger Society tagged me in a post to get to the event, I realized I should and booked a ticket.
After a full day of sitting in the crowd, listening to influential panel speakers and crowd Q&A, I raised my hand to ask a question. With a mic in my hand, I stood. “Hey Ash!” Robin beamed at me from the stage. “I’m so glad you’re here! Everyone, this is Ash. Ash, why don’t you tell everyone how we know each other.” What tumbled out in front of a couple hundred people is all the truth — that she stayed with me in a motorhome for 5 days while she ran 5 marathons across Utah for my charity; that she ran for her mom living with MS, like myself; that I created the relay team she joined because I failed at my fundraising goal during my own solo run across America. Then, I plunge into my question for the panel.
Then there are, of course, all the things I should have said. Like the thousands of dollars Robin has raised for the organization over the years, and how much the organization has raised in total; that we’re currently running across America right now (our 12th annual run) and the significant impact we continue to make. Did I show her enough gratitude for her effort with the charity and the ways she has amplified it since? Did others hear how my voice had shaken slightly? I should have practiced more for such an opportunity. How did I miss obvious key details? I should have been better.
The ways in which I could have been more posed while articulating how Robin and I know each other bubble within my mind. They are beautiful sentences strung together meticulously. They WOW everyone in the room, including Robin. Among the flawless glow of these imagined words, standing in the hotel bathroom brushing my teeth, I feel myself sink.
Can you relate to this beating; this hammering of the mind? The high and excitement of what-was compared to an imagined scenario that is better because you were better. I am all too familiar with it, and in years prior, I’d have endured it. I’d have gotten ready to catch my cab, leaning into the busy-ness of my movements — washing my face, packing the last few items into my carry-on, moving through TSA towards my gate — to dull the criticism until it’s swallowed into the day (hopefully), certain to resurface later at night while I lay in bed.
But, thankfully, gratefully, I’ve learned from Robin to silence that nonsense. It serves absolutely no one for me to allow these nagging imaginations to lower me a notch. Why let them take the spotlight in my mind over the swell of momentum that comes from acknowledging and amplifying the good? Can I allow my experiences to teach me what I can do better? Yes, absolutely. Notes taken. Should I linger and linger and linger on the should-haves, thinking about all the ways I wish I had been more refined yesterday?
Hell fucking no.
I pick up my phone and open Spotify. I search for my current power song and hit play. The drum beats its rhythm and I sing, fully emerging myself into the song.
Adrenaline flows, and I rise.
