How do you deal with failure as a runner?

You need to relax. I used to feel a bit like you (I'm 34), but you need to realize what's important. No one other than you cares about how fast you run. If you stop racing or running "fast," no one cares. Life goes on. Running for 99.5% of us is a hobby and it's not a big deal, whether you're fast or slow. It CAN seem like a big deal at times, but it's not AT ALL. Keep things in perspective.

Good luck!

I troll LR!

The great pro runners when I was a high schooler-

Bill Rodgers-never won an Olympic Medal.

Mary Decker-fell in the Olympics

No matter how good you are-there's someone better, more days than not.

Nobody cares how fast you run. Run for yourself. Running will not "make people happy and inspire." People are selfish, and live in their own worlds. You could win your age group in the NY marathon-and guess what-at work you'll be thought of as "that guy who runs."

Alberto whips me.

Reading letsrun has lead me to believe that talent= rip snorting speed. You sound like someone who was not naturally athletic and never had good speed. What is holding you back is your speed. Take a 180 degree turn on your training and lift heavy and work on speed. Then come back to 5k-HM training. As far as not having a girlfriend or making enough money, drop this "I'm a victim" mentality and step outside your comfort zone.

You need to re-evaluate your reasons for running. Stop comparing yourself to people with more talent than you, because guess what: there will always be people with more talent than you, so until you change your viewpoint, you are setting yourself up for self-loathing and disappointment no matter what your times are.

Run to be the best you can be, and if that doesn't give you pleasure and meaningful challenge, find something else.

Don't make the mistake many people do, which is using running as a barometer of your value and success in life.

Unless you're a world class runner, you're just a big fish in a small pond. I feel like the question you're asking isn't really "how do you deal with failure" because what you're describing is not failure. What you're really asking is "How do I find meaning in my running when I'll never amount to anything?"

The answer - the same way you find meaning in anything in life.

I think success mostly boils down to psychology.

First step: Take control of your mind

Mary Cain and most really successful people KNOW they are capable of achieving at an extremely high level. Think about your psychology - nothing about what you wrote matched Mary Cain's mentality. She doesn't entertain the THOUGHT of embarrassment, disappointment,

... and ending message board posts oddly in mid-sentence when the

Here is some perspective for you. I have had 20 straight years of constant injuries in running. My love of running has given me great disappointments, but has also given me everything good in my life. I have traveled a lot to tons of meets, and my love of running that brought me to the West Coast put my in the time/place to meet my wife a few years ago. All the disappointments sucked, but my desire to keep running has given me everything I could want in the world outside of running. It took me almost 20 years, I am 37 now, to figure out what is important in life. I am as hard as anyone could be on people that aren't focused when they claim they want to train hard and even I figured it out. Hang in there and as much as you think running is important it is not as important as you think. Use it for what it is and enjoy all of it that you can. Enjoy going to meets, enjoy watching them online, get what you can out of the sport if you can't stay healthy or you can't compete at the level you want. Find what you can take positive away from running.

Bummer. Lost network connection so it didn't take it all.

Basically, read the book The Power of Habit ,why we do what we do.

The reason I LOVE this book is because it teaches how to reprogram yourself and your mind.

Time for bed.

I deal with failure by leaving it where it belongs: in the past. It's only just a perception about a memory. A thought about a thought. A true artist of life keeps moving and creating in the present. Don't hang on to it, get moving toward your vision, or chill and enjoy the present.The past is, and always will be a figment of your imagination.

You have to remember that others' opinions of you are based almost 100% on how you perform in races. Your friends and coworkers really do care about how fast you were in your weekend 5k.

Brianruns10 wrote:

I feel in me this incredible untapped potential, potential to do something really well, do something really special and good that could make people happy and inspire, and make up for all the failure in my life up to now.

Maybe a list of all the things that you want to accomplish, and another list of everything you can think of that makes you happy.

Several of my teammates ran under 13:20 for the 5,000m. On more than one occasion I was running with one of them, and we'd run past someone in a wheelchair...or otherwise born or rendered unable to run, Ever. And unprompted, each time, one of us would look at the other and one of us would say "we are so lucky to be able to do this."

None of those guys ever got what they wanted out of running. None of them ever got The Gold Medal.

Running for success or happiness from success at running is a fool's errand. It is the lowest odds for success sporting endeavor there probably is.

Coping, or moving on, for me was a result of several factors. The first was realizing, that no matter how hard I worked, I was never going to get to the Olympics and win a gold medal. I hadn't won the genetic lottery THAT far. And neither had my teammates who were even more talented.

So, accepting that logical fact made it easier.

The second thing was, I had other interests, other things I was passionate about. I stepped off one train, and onto another. I kept running, but for me.

Run for the pure joy of running. Never forgetting for one day, that there are people on this world born without the ability to run, at all, ever, for many varieties of reasons.

Run for the pure joy of running.

Invest in what you are good at, for you, not for others. (Check out a book called Discover Your Strengths. Don't get a used copy or you probably won't be able to take the online assessment, which is actually pretty good.)

Okay, now I am going to give you the hardest answer.

Something happened in your childhood that made you start measuring your worth based on if you accomplished things that pleased others, specifically, your father.

That's not healthy. It may have happened in a simple way, it may not have been your father pressuring you, but none the less it happened.

You could deal with that in therapy. Or self education in personal development.

Here's some good news, you are at about that age where some of the things that gnaw at us into our twenties just start to fall away. You' start to find that some stuff that used to bug you starts to not bug you any more.

As far as finding a girlfriend...there are as many women looking for a guy like you as there are guys like you looking for women. Hell, serial killers get chicks chasing them in jail.

You can't suddenly wake up a good looking alpha male. But you can learn some of the male skills it takes to attract women and be successful with them. You can sit with the status qua and watch nothing change, or you can insist on getting educated in these things.

They've been mentioned many times on this board. Read "The Game." Google "PUA." David DeAngelo is your friend.

Most importantly, get moving on these things.

Good luck.

I'm going to be accused of being politically incorrect but I don't care.

You have too much respect for women.

I don't know if you're trolling. But whatever.

Gosh, man, get a hold of yourself. There's more to life than running and achievements. What's more important is how you live your everyday life and treat others, because so many of us will just wither away into dust over time. All we really have at the end of the day is the times we spent with each other every day. Seriously. You should look back at your life and say, "Man, I really had a good time with those folks and went to some awesome places and did what I could to contribute to other human being."

You think all these pros are perfectly happy people? You think their life is all wine and roses? Heck, I bet Rupp hasn't drunk wine in months, and I pity him, because good wine is a great aspect of being human.

I don't focus on achievements. I focus on squeezing the most out of each day, have a good time with the people around me, and developing good habits. I don't worry about comparing myself to others. I don't care if I have a girlfriend or not.

Nobody ever retires or moves out of their prime running years NOT thinking that 'they should have run faster'. It goes with the sport. Having been removed now from my serious running career, for over 25 years now; it is easier to put it into perspective. Though I still thought I should have faster prs in all of my best races :)

Some of these books that are being mentioned have some elements of buddhism but have spun the concepts in a nonreligious/self help kind of way. Which is the great thing about buddhism, it is actually a practice and can seriously result in change in how you see life and yourself as a person. So would you really be happier and more fulfilled if you were a faster runner? Would be be happier and more fulfilled as a person if you had a better career and more of an impact on the people around you? These are things that people chase after everyday and probably aren't the best ways to find happiness/fulfillment. The desire/striving for something that you cannot have is going to cause suffering and even when you get these things that are not always going to stay the same or get better. What happens if you never get a permanent relationship, never run fast again, have a boring work life that is unfulfilling? Will you be unsatisfied for life? Good luck, keep reading and thinking. Being ok with disappointment/failure will lead to less suffering and ultimately a better existence.