Today’s Best of 2009 Blog Challenge question/prompt is…

Q: Challenge. Something that really made you grow this year. That made you go to your edge and then some. What made it the best challenge of the year for you?

A: The events of the past 2 years brought up fears I hadn’t dealt with before…

A friend died of cancer at 29.  That scared me.  It also brought out the hypochondriac in me.

My aunt/godmother died of cancer.  I looked her in the eyes to say goodbye as I was leaving the hospice, but it was really goodbye forever.  And we both knew that.

Another aunt passed away while I was on tour.  My poor Memere has outlived 3 of her 4 children.  Now my dad is her only living child.

I realized this year how much fear and sadness and especially worry can do a number on your body.  It manifests.  It breaks you down.

I also had a challenging period with my best friend this year.  We’d  never had a problem before, which was part of the problem.

On top of all this, I decided to go for my driver’s license (at 28 yrs old), which brought on a whole other level of stress.  And then I failed my first road test.

These were some of my challenges in 2009.  Some of them were still lingering from the previous year.

Dealing with loss, stress, fear, rejection, and failure pushed me to discover things about myself that I hadn’t realized.  About how I talk to myself in these hard situations (I mean – my inner voice).  About what kind of relationship I have with myself.

All of these challenges throughout the year (and in some cases the previous year) caused me to grow in ways that I, up until that point, only understood intellectually.

I learned the importance of self-friendship (sounds a bit easier to digest than “self-love,” which may induce barfing in some).

I also learned how essential it is to change your physiology in order to get out of a mental rut.

this year, I started running

In May, I ran my first little 5k, and even though it was a short run, I felt exhilarated in meeting that challenge.  It was more than just a physical accomplishment to me.  It was a milestone along a path I had just begun. The months of daily running leading up to that day were more important than any race.  Running became the glue that held me together when life’s stresses threatened to break me down.

Running, for me, is about clearing my mind, getting perspective, and being in the moment with myself.

It was never about that, until this year.