Rush Hour at the Endorphin Factory

4/11/13.  I had an endorphin rush this morning.  Thursdays are usually an easy day for me.  I don't need to be anywhere until 9:30, and so I can turn the alarm off and wake up when I wake up.  This is usually about 6:30.

It's nice to wake up naturally.  I'm usually relaxed and in a good mood and looking forward to a day where I will probably do some things that matter, but without rushing.

The endorphin rushes are apparently a gift from running, but at this point they don't seem to be connected to running.  They show up when they want to, although I think being well-rested, relaxed, and happy helps.

Sometimes when I'm waking up I sense that I'm feeling particularly good, and as I gain consciousness I recognize that I'm in the middle of a rush.  It's important not to move.  I've found that any movement breaks the rush -- it disappears like a spiderweb, and then I might as well get up and have breakfast.

So I just lie there and have the experience.  It's a little difficult to describe.  The mind is very clear.  The body is very alive.  And coursing through every single fiber of my being is this incredible, palpable supply of wellness.

A gift from the pituitary gland, apparently, or at least that seems to be the primary source.  Or, frankly, it may not even be endorphins.  It may be something called anandamide.

I don't care what you call it.  I just know what happens.  And I'm a firm believer in the link to running.

I'm not convinced that I've ever had an actual runner's high, a euphoric state that occurs during a long run or after you stop.  But I have noticed some interesting things that happen to me at the end of marathons, and occasionally late in a long training run.

The definition of pain shifts.  I don't know if the pain actually becomes less, but it loses the ability to dictate what you do.  And time stops being something you measure with a clock.  It becomes I was back there, now I'm here, soon I will go there.  And sometimes it's just I am here.

If it's not endorphins, it's something that manages pain and reorients me to what matters.

And that's what happens to me every once in a while, on a Thursday morning or at some other random, unexpected time.  I can't summon it.  I can't schedule it.  I don't know when it's coming.  All I can do is pay attention when it shows up, and be grateful.

No Fear

“I think some runners just like the pain,” said Katy. We were on our bikes, heading up Martin Luther King Drive in Philadelphia, almost at the Falls Bridge. It’s a pretty piece of parkland, a sylvan bubble just feet from an expressway and a railroad line. You can’t see either one at this point, because of the trees. And then there are the fields of grass and, on the right, the river with its rowers.

Not a bad place to be skewered by a very honest young woman who knows how to speak her mind with diplomatic indirection. I hadn’t been able to go running for a while because of an injury I had basically inflicted on myself. Running injuries are almost always overuse injuries, and I’m an artist at joking about obsessive-compulsive disorder and simple fanaticism. But I’d never looked myself in the mirror while shaving and said, “I like pain.”

I’d helped Katy train for her first two marathons. In the beginning, I had felt faster, and I had been wiser – at least about preparing for a marathon. The faster thing changed early, when she decided I’d be okay with it. And now the tide had shifted in the wisdom river.

As children we’re taught to fear pain. It’s an easy lesson. After all, pain hurts. But I prefer to think of pain as a language. The body has things to tell us. If we listen, we will learn. It’s hard to listen to something you fear. You’re too busy running away.

I remember, I think it was my second marathon, in 2002. I was in mile 26, coming down Kelly Drive past Lloyd Hall. The finish line was just up a slight rise and around a curve, in front of the Art Museum. And I remember feeling that my lungs were very tired from all the breathing they had been doing. It wasn’t really pain, more just a sensation that the surface fabric, down inside my lungs, had been worn down by all that air. I’ve never had that sensation since, possibly because of better training. And I think it’s also true that, in mile 26 of a marathon, the definition of pain has shifted a bit.

What did this sensation tell me? It told me I was okay. It told me I was very tired. And it told me to do more long runs next time.

The idea of liking pain takes you to some very strange places – self-flagellation in the Christian church, and masochism for the psychologically inclined. None of this works for me. It would help if people talked about this more, with a little more depth than, “Boy, that really hurt.”

I do have certain pains that are old friends. There’s one in my right knee. It’s from an old injury. Every once in a while it just shows up for a visit. Doesn’t mean any harm. Goes away after a while.

So I have some old friends, and I do seem to make new acquaintances on a fairly regular basis. But do I like pain? I don’t know. But I do know that I don’t fear it. When it shows up, I don’t run away. I listen.