Emily Articulated: Hard things

By Emily Erickson
Reader Columnist

I spent this past weekend running the Orcas Island Marathon, my first trail race of the season. The course covered 26.5 winding miles and more than 6,000 feet of climbing — about three Mickinnicks-worth of vertical gain — which, to us winter-dwellers doing most of our training on snow-covered roads and the god-forsaken treadmill, is quite the springtime task.

Emily Erickson.

My marathon morning started with an early rise and pre-race rituals: slurping coffee and forcing down a slice of peanut butter toast, pinning on my race number, taking a jog, stretching my legs, zipping in and out of the bathroom, and picking my way through the crowd in search of the perfect place on the start line (not too in front to jinx myself, but not so far back that I’ll have to zigzag around people to earn my position). 

As the start approached, I bobbed from my left foot to my right foot and back again, brushing shoulders with my neighbors among the hundred other racers doing the same.

Finally, the announcer began counting down from five, his voice booming over me and the other eager runners with every number called until a crowd full of cheers and his bellowed “Start!” kicked us into motion. 

Our pack poured through the race arch — an inflatable tower marking both the beginning and the end of our feat — with a marathon’s-worth of experiences to be had in between.

On one side of this arch, we were fresh-faced and nervous, our legs tingling in anticipation of what we were asking them to accomplish; on the other side, we’d be sweat-and-mud-crusted, grimacing in discomfort and begging our legs to make it down the final stretch before giving way.

When it was finally my turn to pass under the side of the arch reading “Finish,” having climbed mountains, circumnavigated most of a state park and only moderately successfully kept my race-long nausea at bay, I was surprised at how quickly my exhaustion transformed into elation upon crossing the line — flooding me with the kind of joy and sense of accomplishment that only comes from being done, from working hard and from pushing through discomfort to emerge on the other side unscathed.

Sitting in the grass with lactic acid filling my sore legs, I ate every bit of food placed in front of me and watched other runners racing to their own finishes, transforming their pain into joy in the same ways I had. It made me wonder why I’m like this — why we were all like this — compelled to search the depths of our own limits to find something meaningful amid the discomfort. Every person grimacing their way across the finish line paid money to register for the event, planned out days of travel, booked accommodations, and took time off from work and other responsibilities, all to join together in the exercise of pain, the camaraderie of effort and a collective reveling in achievement afterward. 

It seems such a part of the human experience to seek out these and other types of challenges, despite a lack of any obvious extrinsic reward (because medals are nice, but are certainly not “the point”). We embark on hard things — things that often cause pain or  discomfort — because we place value on that effort. Dubbed by researchers as the “Effort Paradox,” this phenomenon asserts that people and animals alike tend to associate effort with reward and will sometimes pursue outcomes because of the effort they require, rather than in spite of it.

Another framing of this idea that has permeated the outdoor recreation world for decades is the idea of “Type II” fun — or the kind of fun that’s more enjoyable in retrospect. This is the kind of “fun” that compels us to climb mountains, write books, swim channels, survivalist-style camp and engage in other questionable-on-their-surface activities.

Getting to the heart of our motivation to pursue effort-filled endeavors, Brooke Struck, Ph.D., and research director at The Decision Lab, writes, “We have this natural desire to create a narrative arc of our lives and the meaning that we bring to the world, and overcoming challenges helps us do that.” 

Brooke’s research draws the connection between the gratification resulting from Type II fun and the struggle involved in achieving it. We are hardwired to pursue hard things and to use those hard things to create meaning within our lives. Long-term goals and the pursuit of challenges allow us to reach beyond the immediate reward centers in our brains, instead accessing the parts responsible for building our identities. 

And so it’s this idea, and another quote of Brooke’s that I mutter to myself, “challenge is the site of growth, and growth helps define who we are as people,” as I plunk in my credit card information on yet another race registration. All in the name of personal growth, after all.

Emily Erickson is a writer and business owner with an affinity for black coffee and playing in the mountains. Connect with her online at www.bigbluehat.studio.