Every year in early December, I question every life choice I made that put me in the same situation.
Why? Because that is when the annual Ragnar Trail Florida event takes place. And right now is when my team starts planning.
For those of you who don’t have any idea what this race entails, in a nutshell: a team of 8 (or 4 if you want more of a challenge, or one if you are completely insane) camps in the Florida woods (errr…swamp?) for 24 hours and runs a relay race totaling about 15 miles per person.
You run during the day, you run at night, and you sleep — kind of.
And YES – we do this voluntarily.
Because of the leg I choose to run, my nighttime loop is the red loop which is also the hardest and longest loop.
That means I’m alone, in the woods, at night, in Florida. I’ll give you a moment to process who or what is out there with me at that point.
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By my third and final loop, I’m tired. My legs are screaming. I’ve barely slept. And somewhere in the middle of the woods I inevitably start thinking…
“Why do I do this to myself?”
But by the time I finish, and my team runs across the finish line together, I am so proud of myself, proud of my team and the experience we just had together.
And despite everything I spent 24 hours putting my body through, I somehow forget that I questioned my life choices in the middle of it and I’m ready to sign up again.
As we start planning this year’s race, I realized there’s a reason the hard parts never make me want to stop.
It’s because I know why I’m there.
Even at 2 a.m., when I can only see as far as my headlamp reaches, I know what I’m working toward.
Even when my legs hurt – I know where I’m going.
Even when I can’t see the finish line – I know there is one.
And that makes the hard stuff easier. Not easy, but easier.
When Everything Starts to Feel Heavy
Here’s why I bring all of this up. It feels like we sometimes lose that sense of purpose in everyday life.
We get buried in emails, meetings, appointments, deadlines, responsibilities and endless checklists.
We put our heads down, get through the list and move on to the next item.
And eventually everything starts to feel heavy or complex.
Sometimes it’s because we genuinely have too much on our plates.
But sometimes, I think it’s because we’ve been so focused on what’s directly in front of us that we’ve lost sight of what all of it is supposed to add up to.
There’s a big difference between having a lot to do and not knowing why you’re doing all of it.
I can handle a lot.
What I don’t do particularly well is feeling like I’m running really hard without knowing whether I’m running in the right direction.
Business is no different.
Marketing is marketing. Sales is selling. Operations is operating.
Everyone has their list and things are getting checked off.
But does everyone know where they’re going?
More importantly, does everyone know why they’re heading there?
Clarity Doesn’t Mean Having All the Answers
For me, this is why clarity matters, and for a long time, even I looked at clarity wrong.
Clarity doesn’t mean having the entire course mapped out in front of you. I certainly can’t see the entire red loop at 2 a.m.
Sometimes it just means being able to see the next trail marker — or, if you’re familiar with Ragnar, one of those irritatingly funny signs that says “one(ish) mile to go.”
Clarity means knowing what matters right now and why you’re moving toward it. It means being able to distinguish between what is imperative to your purpose and what you can let go.
And maybe most importantly, it gives you enough room to look up every once in a while.
To notice the people around you. To enjoy what you’re building.
Or, in my case, to turn off the noise in my head long enough to notice just how clear the sky is and how bright the stars are in the middle of the woods.
The course isn’t any shorter. The hills don’t disappear. And whatever just made that noise in the bushes is DEFINITELY still out there.
But it doesn’t all feel quite as heavy when you know where you’re going and why you’re going there.
Maybe that’s what I’ve really meant all along when I say: Clarity Creates Momentum.
Not because clarity makes everything easy.
→ But because clarity lets you distinguish between what deserves your attention and what is simply demanding it. When you can do that, you have enough capacity to actually experience the journey instead of just surviving it.
