No Limits

Okay, so for those of you who don't know this already...I am an NPR junkie.

I grew up listening to NPR, spent many years as a child listening to our local station from the backseat of my parent's cars, but I truly became a die-hard never turn my back NPR listener in New York, while working nights as a word-processor at a law firm. Much of the work was solitary and tedious, but the saving grace was that we were allowed to wear headphones and listen to whatever we wanted while we worked. My music collection got old pretty quickly and so I soon began trolling the internet airwaves for other distractions.

That is when I found Ira Glass and This American Life. The. Best. Radio. Show. Ever. (Well, almost...but I'll get to that in a minute). When I tell you that I am a huge fan, I am not exaggerating. When I tell you that I am such a big fan that I sort of fell temporarily and madly in love with Ira Glass, I am not exaggerating. When I tell you that I am such a big fan I wrote an overly long and overly poetic fan letter to aforementioned adorably nerdy host, I am not exaggerating. And when I tell you that I have listened to EVERY SINGLE EPISODE of This American Life from 1995 to the present, I am not exaggerating.

(that's 403 episodes, but who's counting?)

That show saved my life...I have vivid memories of sorting files in a conference room at some ungodly hour and weeping over some touching story being piped through my headphones.

And from there my tastes expanded...Fresh Air, Speaking of Faith, Wait Wait Don't Tell Me! (okay, that one is just nerdy), and most recently...Radio Lab.

Dear, sweet Radio Lab...the scientific step-sister of This American Life. If you have never heard of this show...go find it, and listen to an episode. I suggest the episode on Sleep as a starting place. Radio Lab is a much less prolific show than TAL, producing only a handful of shows per season (the new season starts this week!!), partly because it is highly produced and takes, I'm sure, many many man hours to put together.

Wait, so...what does any of this have to do with anything?

Um...

Ah, yes. Limits. Limits, limits, limits.

So, the most recent episode of Radio Lab is called "Limits", and the first story in the episode is about a woman named Julie Moss, who competed in the 1982 Iron Man Triathalon in Hawaii, having never ever competed in anything like a triathalon before, having no real distance training in anything, and not even really understanding the HUGEness of something like a triathalon. (In case you don't know, a triathalon is a 2.4 mile swim, a 112 mile bike rice and an entire 26 mile MARATHON.)

Yes. That.

So, the story that Ms. Moss tells--and I'll just paraphrase here, because I highly suggest you listen to it--is that she realizes, mid-way through the race, that she is doing REALLY WELL. And in fact, many miles into the marathon part of the event, she is in first place. And when she realizes this (she's only a college student at the time she did the race) she gets really attached to the idea of winning--she feels like she has just found something she's really good at, and she wants to, well, keep that feeling. But her body, totally unused to this kind of physical TORMENT, does not cooperate. And when she is almost to the finish line, her body gives out, in a myriad of ways, and though she wants more than anything to quit...she doesn't.

I'm attaching the video of the final moments of her race here so you can see it for yourself (it's mind-boggling)...



That's right. She crawls to the finish line. Her body has thrown her to the ground over and over again, but she does. Not. Stop.

And in the interview for Radio Lab she talks about how when she was on the ground, totally spent, this little voice in her just insistently urged her to "get up", and she concludes the entire story by declaring, about the human being and our bodies and our spirits..."there are no limits."

"None?" The hosts ask.

"Nope." She says.

"Nope."

And I found this story so moving...moving in that unplaceable way...moving in a way that my whole body responded to...not because she wasn't a quitter--that's such a rigid idea anyhow, that we're never allowed to quit anything--but because she was just determined to finish. That's it. She was determined to finish...and she did. Against all odds. Against the total rebellion of her body.

And it made me think about how often it is that we are right near the finish line in our lives...almost there...almost in contact with what we want or who we are, and how many times that is the moment when everything goes beserk. And it made me think about how those moments in our life are such decisive moments, how they might be the moments when everything in us and around us is telling us to lie down, to give up, to rest...but that there is another choice. There is a choice to summon up the deepest reserves of who we are and what we want, and to push forward. EVEN if it's not going to be the triumphant finish we thought it would be...even if we might be humiliated in the process...we still have a choice.

If there are no limits, then it means that ANYTHING which is thrown at us can be overcome, and that no matter where we're standing...even if we're not standing at all...even if we're lying on the track in our own, um, you-know-what...still we can get up and go forward. And if we can't get up, we can crawl. But we can get there.

xoxo
YogaLia