It’s the Most Wonderfully Exhausting Time of the Year

Every year, my wife and I pledge that this Advent will be different — less focused on getting stuff done, and more focused on spiritual preparation. But every year, this one included, that noble sentiment is overwhelmed by the crushing force of reality. There are family celebrations to tend to, gifts for nieces and nephews to purchase and send off, Advent parties, “Nutcracker” rehearsals for our daughter, Christmas cards to write. Then there’s running.

Somehow, in the midst of this madness is the pressing need to keep up with my running schedule: because I’ve got a marathon to run in three months, because my sanity depends on it, and because I have to do something to burn off all the Christmas cookies, pumpkin pie, and omnipresent chocolates. But finding time is hard, and finding the energy when I routinely go to bed too late and wake up too early is harder still.

Jeff Galloway offers some useful tips to getting in holiday-season runs. The two best, for me anyway, are “plan ahead” and “pick quiet times” (i.e., go when everyone is asleep). Throughout Advent, I’ve been planning my runs a week in advance — it’s the only way I’ve been able to make sure they happen. And true enough, several of these runs have had to come bright and early, when everyone else was asleep. (This isn’t very conducive to rest, but it does get the job done.)

Of course, this doesn’t answer the spiritual dilemma: How does squeezing in one more activity into the day help with the spiritual preparation? Answer: It doesn’t, but it can.

Seeing that we are either unwilling or unable to shake most of the season’s responsibilities, my wife and I have tried this year to think of our current, insane pace of life as its own kind of penance. The lack of sleep — a penance. The constant treks and tasks — a penance. The inevitable computer meltdowns as I try to print out labels for the Christmas cards — a penance.

Likewise, running in the cold and dark can be a penance. Or running on insufficient sleep. Or, for that matter, foregoing a run altogether because there are more important obligations elsewhere. The point is: Any burden can be offered up, and any activity can be coupled with prayer. If we are unable to make Advent a time of peaceful preparation, then at least maybe we can make it a time of fitful preparation. (As an aside, I’ve been trying, with mixed success, to incorporate the Joyful Mysteries into some runs.)

Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel!