Running Faster

1-7-12 9:15am
Folsom Street Coffee

Just now, a young woman ran past me while I was stopped at a traffic light. Or rather, she pranced past me in light brown cowboy boots. The rest of her outfit was black with some furry bits. She carried a brown satchel and a pink backpack. She was trying to catch a bus, and looked like she was trying to run fast. But she carried herself as though a veneer of poise was mandatory. Like she wouldn’t be caught dead being frantic. So she pranced, like a pony. It occurred to me that, in a way, she was holding herself back. Part of her just wanted to haul ass and get there, but a stronger part of her kept rigid, reminding her that she must keep up appearances.

I am reminded of dreams I used to have, dreams where I was running. For whatever reason, I had to run as fast as I could. But something always held me back, like I was running through jello. Imagine trying to force your body to go fast, but it’s stuck in slow motion. Clearly, my mind was holding me back. I don’t know if I held myself back for the same reasons as the girl I saw today. Perhaps it was just the boots and heavy load that kept her from running at her potential speed. But the site of her instantly evoked a feeling of tension, as between opposing impulses.

We all want to live up to our full potential. That’s part of being human. Yet from a young age, we are taught to hold it back, reign it in, behave ourselves. That’s part of being civilized. I’m not making a judgement about this, it’s a reality of modern life. We’ve lived that way for so many years that it’s hardwired. But when you were a kid, you had big ideas. Maybe you wanted to leap over tall buildings or swing between them. Maybe you wanted to invent a time machine or an intergalactic spaceship. Maybe you wanted to live in a crystal castle. It should go without saying that none of us has ever done any of those things. But people have climbed skyscrapers. People have gone into space. People have harnessed the power of crystals to keep precise time in little wearable devices, and become wealthy enough to live wherever they wanted. We all have the potential to do that. We hold ourselves back thanks to years of conditioning. But that blockage is mental, and the mind is more malleable than most people know. You can change your mind, and once you do that, you can do everything that’s possible. Running fast will just be the beginning.