The Current Sauce

Issue date: 9/23/09 Section: Opinions

Your heart is pounding. Your ears are ringing. Sweat drips from your brow as you gasp for breath.
You know that if you can just push through the pain that it will all cease. You know that if you can just make it a few more steps that the hurt will go away and everything will be better.

But you know if you give up, if you quit running, the pain will subside. If you quit now you will have instantaneous relief.

"Push past the pain" is the phrase that would echo across the track as my coach pushed us forward.

"Pain is temporary, but pride is forever" is what my directors would repeat throughout the endless rehearsals in the summer heat.

The trek for a collegiate education is similar to the trek around the track field. You run around in circles waiting for the point just to get a little medal at the end of the race.

You run knowing that everyone else is faster than you and watch in agony as each person crosses the finish line in triumph.

It hurts like hell, and you cannot help but think how easy it would be to throw in the towel and walk out. You feel like you have fallen so far behind. You are convinced there is no way you could catch up.

You know you failed the sociology exam as you shamefully hand it in to the professor.

You are a week late for your first paper and have yet to figure out how you are going to catch up with your online course.

You look at yourself in disgust when you get ready in the morning because you have managed to fall so far behind.

You are tired and sore and want to quit the race. You want to stop running.

College is no walk in the park and many students think it is easiest to find the nearest exit.

My first day on a college campus, I sat in the auditorium with the other freshman during freshman orientation. Our dean of students walked up the microphone and said, "Look to your neighbor. One of you will not graduate."

Little did I know, he was talking to me.

Suicide is the second leading cause of death for college students, according to Suicide.org. And the number one cause of suicide in college students is untreated depression.

College burns. It hurts and it sucks the life out of you at times. You spend most of your nights with a pile of books at your side and a cup o' Joe to your right.

College eats you up from the inside. It rips at you until you are convinced you have seen your final day.

You are scared and nervous and anxious as a freshman. You look wide-eyed at the seniors and think, "How are they doing this? I will never survive."

You walk lost down the halls wishing that someone would know your name. Someone would reach out and grab your hand.

You long for that phone call from home. You no longer fear the infamous "freshman 15" because you are so depressed that you cannot eat. You haven't made many friends, and you don't want to sit alone in the café. You just wait for someone to rescue you.

The thing about running is that at some point you no longer feel the pain. It no longer hurts to push forward.

Some call it the "runner's high." Some find it to be the most exhilarating experience. Once you reach that high, you can run for miles. It no longer hurts, and you no longer desire to stop.

But first, before you reach that point, you have to suffer. You have to feel the burn and endure through the pain.

You might never get first place. You might forever see everyone else cross the finish line first. You might still feel alone when you run.

But the thing about the race, it is not the medal that is important. It is the journey you traveled and the choices you made.

It is about each stride that brought you closer to the finish line.

It is about the times you fell down but found the courage and the strength to stand back up and run.

You can spend your entire collegiate career making A's or finishing first. But you can never understand what it means if you never feel the shame of a C or the sting of a safety.

If you never fall down, how can you ever learn to stand up?

And then once you learn, you have the ability to reach over and help those who fall with you.

College is a scary place. It is big and new and different.

But this is your opportunity to practice falling. This is when you get to learn to stand.

You just need to be willing to run the long hall.

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