Would you think running a full marathon without any training is achievable? Allow me to paint a wilder picture in your minds - would you be able to run a full marathon and drink wine multiple times in between the race? If you can pull off the Barney Stinson, sign-up for the most fun marathon ever and skip this story! However, if you have cause for reasonable doubt, read on!

This blog is about what went through my mind in the course of this race and drawing parallels to some theories from books and the movie Dune. My motivation behind writing this story is to show you that you can reach beyond your potential - by training your subconscious. I have split this story by turning points in my first ever marathon. But first,

Does 5K mean year 5000? This was me at the start of the year 2023. I really had no experience running besides chasing my dog. But all of this changed in 2023. My partner and I would run frequently in the forests of a french town in France where I did my MBA. We frequently did 5Ks. She then thought I could train myself (magically?) in the summer to run a marathon. Not just a simple marathon but a marathon with copious amounts of wine, cheese, oysters, and runners wearing costumes (see images below!). Of course, I did not train in the summer or think it was achievable.

The Start (Your thinking based on past performance and history - your anchor):

The stage is set, people ready to drink wine in beautiful Bordeaux with crisp air inviting warmth. My partner and I planned to run a 10K, drink a lot more wine and be in awe of the chateaus. To bring context in the real world, we usually perform tasks or activities with a certain target in our minds and anchor ourselves to it. This was me doing that. I was running with my partner, who unlike me is really into running and other weird races - she completed the iron man a few years ago. So I started the race as I set my goal to achieving a 10K with a strong positive mindset.

Reaching 10K (Your thinking based on what you think is achievable):

As we completed 10K, I felt great. I thought that was achievable at the start of the race and I maintained that frame of mind. I also thought it was the most I could. As I finished the 10K (wine count: 4), it struck me that I have no idea what will happen to me if I carry on running. I became fearful. Thoughts turned instantly negative. Isn’t this also how we think in our daily lives? We look for things we want to do, assess, think, think, think and then before you know it, we are focusing on all the negative scenarios that could possibly occur.

In this moment, my partner mentioned a scenario where we would just run as much and enjoy the process. I told that to my myself a couple times and went on. Joseph Murphy in The Power of your Subconscious Mind says that once a seed of a thought has been planted and if you keep thinking about it, it will grow. That’s what happened. I kept telling myself in my head, over and over again that I can go a bit more and so I did…

Reaching 21K (Your thinking based on the immediate past and battling a rational brain):

I’m dumbfounded, drenched, and dehydrated. I couldn’t believe what just happened. This is after having 11 tastings of wine along the way. In fact, I felt better running between 10-21K than I did when I ran from 5-10K. Rationally, I should’ve been more tired now than I was at 10K. But I wasn’t. I had more wine by now than I did at 10K. Morgan Housel, author of best-sellers The Psychology of Money and Same as Ever, talks about how the world is driven by forces that cannot be measured. He gives an example of a physiologist who does a lot of math to calculate how fast a man can run and tried to use it to predict race winners. But on the racetrack, these calculations had zero ability to predict race winners. Why? Because performance is not based on what you’re physically capable of. It’s what you are capable of within the context of what your brain is willing to ensure for the risk and reward in the given moment. I was in that moment at my peak performance as my brain kept getting constant positive reward signals. I went on…

Reaching 35K (Your thinking based primarily on motivation and positive feedback): 

Every km is taking longer and longer now. From 21K to 35K, I was getting weaker mentally. I was certain the organisers miscalculated distances between each km. As I mentioned earlier, this was in the truest sense a real marathon. This meant it had a pace cart. I had no idea what a pace cart meant until it showed up. A pace cart is what you need to be ahead of to be considered a valid runner. As it came neck-to-neck, my partner told me what it could mean if we were to fall behind the cart. Morgan in the book Same as Ever, talks about how incentives are the most powerful force in the world. Indeed, at that time, my incentive to be ahead of the pacer was extremely high. Humans are prone to such emotions (pride in this case). When failure stares at you so intensely and closely, you are incentivised to act. My thoughts again turned to just run. My thoughts were focused on this new threat and that’s pretty much all I focused on until I got to 35K. I can imagine you would have instances in your life where you have performed extremely well or as my consulting friends call it - efficient and effective - in times of stress or threats. A lot of my performance depended on my mental state. Joseph Murphy says it best - the subconscious mind is amenable to suggestion and is controlled by your suggestion.

Just in case you are curious to know how my partner was doing: she was sipping on full-bodied wines, eating cheese, oysters, and going back and forth to get more wine! I decided to be a teetotaller after completing 21K. Choose your battles.

Reaching 41K:

There are a few things that define you. I’ve faced many failures in my life. I know for a fact, that each one of you too has faced multiple failures. But this is what defines us. Grit. This is what powered me along in the last few kms of the race. But it was not enough…it never was. 

Reaching the Finish Line:

The last kilometre was a long windy tarmac path to the finish line. If there was something that was constant through the last 21K of the race was my partner’s encouragement and positive thoughts. I didn’t realise how critical her words were to get me through the finish line. Only after reading books and research studies after, I realised her impact. Her constant words of encouragement were communicated to my subconscious repeatedly and my body reciprocated. If I remove my partner’s encouragement from this race, I would have forfeited a long time ago.

The mental affirmation:

The conclusion to this story is for you to encourage yourself, think and train your mind to achieve what you wish to envision. Find yourself someone who can motivate and encourage you consistently. Do not fear. Joseph Murray in the book talks about fear. He says that fear is a thought in your mind and you are afraid of your own thoughts. Even in the blockbuster Dune series, Paul’s mother Lady Jessica emphasises how fear is just a thought in your mind and it can be conquered.

Train your mind consistently like a marathon.

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