North: Finding My Way While Running the Appalachian Trail

by Scott Jurek

“Fat is the enemy of speed.”

Applause makes it hard to hear yourself.

What’s one more mile when you’ve already run forty-nine?

Honor and integrity were everything.

Why bother calculating? So I thought about the step in front of me, and the step in front of that one.

just needed to let myself run.

When you’re pursuing hard challenges, emotions rise to the surface, and I was so much more fragile than I’d been back in Boulder.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles …. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly … who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

Our sport shows there’s hope for different kinds of humans to get along and not hate each other—at least, if they all have a similar goal to concentrate on.

To me, anyone who runs or mindfully moves their body is working on excellence.

Perspective can be both humbling and inspiring.

The mind of a warrior (or anyone performing a difficult task) should be so attuned to the moment that thoughts and emotions do not impede proper action. A mind in this condition is thought to function so optimally that the right decisions come naturally and pain and fear disappear. I often saw similarities between this mind-set and what elite athletes refer to as being “in the zone.”