Mostly Half Empty

Most pessimists think of themselves as realists, or maybe pragmatists, myself included. I don't think of myself as being a downer all the time, and I certainly know the value of believing believing that something can be done in order to make it happen. But I think on the glass-half-full, glass-half-empty spectrum, I lean more towards the latter.

I'm always telling myself that something is going to suck, that it's going to hurt, that I might not finish. So much so that I'm embarrassed to share these thoughts with others because they seem irrational (and, well, pessimistic). I mean, you never hear Lance Armstrong or Dean Karnazes talk like this. I even feel a little superstitious about it, in that I worry I won't do well unless I purposefully worry that I won't do well (if that makes sense).

But I found this article about Jenny Barringer's (failed) bid at the NCAA Cross Country Championships particularly insightful to my disposition. Specifically the author's assertion:

If Barringer had simply gone into the race expecting it to be extremely painful, and expecting her victory to come with great difficulty, she would have won. As her rebound at the end of the race demonstrated, there was nothing physically wrong with her. Yet her meltdown was not “all mental,” either. The subconscious brain is in the driver’s seat during races. When it decides to make you bonk, you bonk. A runner can no more overcome fatigue caused by the subconscious brain through “mind over matter” than a person could jump off a building [or] fly by overcoming gravity through mind over matter.

Reading the above article makes me think that there is a good reason for my worry, that it's really just my brain and body getting all of the dials adjusted to prepare for suffering. In the end, hopefully I suffer less because I think I'm going to suffer more.