Honestly, that phrase was said a lot on my team. I began saying it even when something really wasn’t a struggle. There is a lot of traffic. The struggle is real. There is a bat flying around our room. The struggle is real. That bus was way too snug. The struggle is real. You get the point. It was our key phrase on our team.
Now after being home 4 months I think to myself how much I loved that “struggle.” That struggle of getting up at 5 am to go swimming in one of the most beautiful oceans I have been to, with kids that don’t get to ever do that. That struggle of living in with 6 other people twenty four hours a day. That struggle of not understanding what the tub tuk driver was saying but just smiling and nodding and ending up in a completely wrong area of the city. The struggle of wearing the same clothes weekly. The struggle of having to intentionally invest in peoples lives even if you were only there for a month. I miss that struggle because it really wasn’t a struggle at all. It was beautiful. It was a gift.
Now after being home and moving to a new city I find myself always wishing to be back in those days. The days of the Race, even the long ones that when I was in them wished they were over.
It’s comical because on the Race every alumni Racer you talked to told you to BE WHERE YOU ARE. That concept has always been so difficult to me to live out. I have always had the tendency to wish the current season away. But isn’t it the truth that you don’t know what you got till it’s gone?
I didn’t realize just how much I would miss Race life. I didn’t realize how much I would miss the people who understood me from the inside out, the people who could call me out when I was being ridiculous but loved me anyway. There’s something truly special about living with a group of people that know you. Truly know you and choose to love you daily.
This post-race life struggle is real.
What does one do with this struggle? Simply, I need to keep telling myself it’s not a struggle. If we could only remember the lessons we learned prior and hold on to them? Wouldn’t that be nice..it’s like I am always relearning what I thought I grasped before. But simply being where I am, is what I am called to do.
I feel like after a year of being told what I will be doing every day that I have lost the understanding that I have to create the day I want here. I have to create the person I want to be. It’s not handed to be. Ministry is not handed to me. Community is not handed to me. Team members that constantly push to be better are not handed to you. Now I have to create it for myself.
What’s interesting is that the Race life doesn’t just activate right when you get on the Race either. You had to create all these things. And now it seems like I have forgotten that I know how to do that.
So I will get through this struggle. I will get through this season. It’s not gonna be easy. It’s not gonna be fun. But it’ll happen.
So to Racers on the field, you will miss this life. To Racers beginning, take it all in. Every moment. To Racers in the same place as me, I’m with you. We need each other. But we must live now. We have learned some valuable things & we must carry that with us. But we have things to learn or re-learn now. Let’s get to it.
