I wouldn’t consider myself a runner or an athlete. But I run almost daily to preserve some semblance of athletic ability as I age. It is a time where I step away from work, plug in a podcast, and allow my body to push itself. It is something that I have learned to prioritize for both mental and physical health.
Living in the hills of western of western Pennsylvania means that runs outside usually are on uneven terrain. My house sits on the highest hill in the neighborhood, and I find myself ascending and descending many times on my route. When I first started running, the descent down hills is where I coasted and found that I would accelerate because of the ease of the run. When I ran uphill, I found myself slowly chugging along, feeling like I was not getting anywhere, almost like a bike in low gear.
But the more I ran, I began to notice a change in how I attacked the terrain. Because my leg muscles had developed, I had to decelerate to go down the hills so I did not go head over heels. Going uphill, I found myself accelerating because my body was rising to the challenge and wanted to conquer the hill. I found that many times I actually ran faster uphill.
In thinking about this, I realized that this is similar to how my spiritual life has progressed. In the beginning, when it came to doing the hard things in the faith (giving up sin, spending time in prayer, fasting, etc) which can be likened to going uphill, it seemed like I made very little progress other than suffering through. Conversely, the easy things of the spiritual life (celebrating feasts, focusing on consolations of God’s love, etc) which can be likened to going downhill, were a time of coasting and felt like I was progressing in the spiritual life.
But as I spiritually developed, I found that my soul liked rising to the challenge of more time in prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, and felt less fulfilled in the downhills of the faith. My soul had come to realize what so many saints have over the centuries: The cross is the key to Jesus.
With this all being said, there is still a spiritual development that has to continue to occur for me and others like me. If we focus so much on achieving the hard works of the faith, we can turn our good actions prideful or treat them as a checklist. While they are good for spiritual progression, they must be done in the correct spirit: love. So in essence, we need to get to the point where our soul runs both uphill and downhill at the same consistent speed, both relishing in the consolations of God, and bearing the cross in peace. It may seem like a minor thing to evaluate, but it could be the difference between mediocrity and sainthood. This is because the even keeled soul shows that it has complete humility and trust in God no matter the circumstance. No need to run faster or slower, just need to keep pace with Jesus on our journey to our heavenly Father. And this pace will reveal to us that both the consolations of God and the cross of Jesus are one in the same.
