I was running the Marine Corps Marathon in DC. The race starts at the Arlington National Cemetery. It finishes -- uphill -- at the Iwo Jima Memorial. We runners numbered about 15,000. In effect, we had joined the Marine Corps for the day. We'd taken basic training, gone to boot camp, and been our own drill instructor. Raw recruits at one time, we were now seasoned warriors, ready to face one of the most grueling challenges known to man. Forget that some of us were elite athletes while others were back-of-the-packers. Together we comprised a people's army, a militia with a single motto: Semper Fi. Like the Marines in Fallujah, we'd found in ourselves a courage we never knew we possessed.
Taking a body through a 26.2-mile race does immeasurably more for you than years of psychological counseling. The only experience I can compare it with is a brisk autumn gallop with your horse or maybe a 20-foot wave at Sunset Beach. "Man must be stretched," wrote William James. "If not in one way, then another." In a marathon, the runner is pushed to his absolute limit. But like a Marine, you are willing to pay the price in pain and even agony.
And the enduring, the surviving, does not stop with the finish line.