Of Mushrooms and Movements (running version)

(Note: I wrote the original version of this post last year for Third Act Maryland. “Movement” there referred to that of a community of people toward common goals related to the climate crisis and democracy. This current post is a longer, running version, a sort of in the long run version. 😊)

Movement is life. This is true for an individual and is true for a collective. Movement is, obviously, the foundation of the running community, not just in the literal sense, but also in the sense of the organic development and growth of this running community. “Community” here is not that which is explicitly organized (e.g., a running club); but, rather, that which forms organically, via shared activities (e.g., races), shared experiences (e.g., training for races), and, increasingly, shared concern about the effects of a fast-warming climate on running and on outdoor sports in general. Heat-related issues in the 2021 Tokyo Summer Olympics dramatically highlighted this latter concern. Air pollution as well, from burning fossil fuels, forest fires, and other sources, can affect running performance. Here is an interesting example of an interactive map of climate change impacts along the Western States Endurance Run course (oldest 100-mile race in the United States) in the Sierra Nevada foothills. (The map was created by Dr. Brianna R. (Pagán) Corremonte of Development Seed and formerly of NASA GES DISC. The image shown is a screen capture of the actual map, with added annotations in red.)

But what sustains this movement?

1. A community of skilled and dedicated people, of course, without which there is no movement. A community belonging to the Church of the Long Run; a community that “is a highly self-selective one and, thus, is open to everyone”; a community in which each member is always asking that eternal question of life, “why I run?”

2. The planning and carrying out of episodic actions that provide focus and expression. Foot races and the associated volunteering and fund-raising are obvious. Sanctuary Runners, a solidarity-through-sport initiative in Ireland, “uses running, jogging and walking to bring together asylum seekers, refugees, migrants and all Irish residents.”

3. A vision of what else the world could be like. Running provides such a vision.

But a movement is also sustained by the ongoing work in between the actions, and that ongoing work provides the necessary stability, continuity, connections and relationships, self-healing, and self-improvement. In essence, the ongoing work in between actions forms the foundation of a movement.

Writer, activist, and Third Act advisor Rebecca Solnit provided a wonderful mushroom metaphor for this ongoing work in an illustration based on this article in The Guardian. Solnit wrote, “After a rain mushrooms appear on the surface of the earth as if from nowhere. Many come from a sometimes vast underground fungus that remains invisible and largely unknown. What we call mushrooms, mycologists call the fruiting body of the larger, less visible fungus. Uprisings and revolutions are often considered to be spontaneous, but it is the less visible long-term organising and groundwork – or underground work – that often laid the foundation.” (There have been a lot of studies on this common mycorrhizal network or, more popularly known, “wood wide web.” A few recent articles: 1, 2, 3. Note also the associated controversy: 4, 5.)

This centrality of relationships and connectedness, and the importance of the in-between, foundational, and often not very visible work can be found nearly everywhere, including, literally, in the foundations of buildings. For competitive athletes, for whom movement is literal, the analogy obviously is the long periods of training in between competitions.

In fact, the importance of in-between work is universal. This ongoing work in between actions is also the foundation of nature, at all scales of space and time. A landslide, e.g., “occurs when forces acting down-slope (mainly due to gravity) exceed the strength of the earth materials that compose the slope.”  It’s the visible episodic action resulting from this exceedance, the causes of which are the in-between work (e.g., changes in ground water, stream erosion).

Basically, it’s the question of process vs. goal, where process is the in-between work and goal is the episodic action. Goal is not the point, just a milepost, a measure of productivity, a by-product of process. That is not to say goals are not important. Goals and success or failure in achieving them can be, obviously, consequential. And goals can be motivating in that achieving. But, in the larger context, process--or, rather, process with presence and intention--is the goal.

Similarly, I don’t run in order to race; I run to run. Race is just a measure of how I’m running. As Annie Dillard famously wrote in The Writing Life, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” Adapted to running a marathon, “How we run our steps is, of course, how we run our marathons.” If a marathoner is focused on the here and now--the next step--there is no need to think about the goal. Eventually, they will get to the finish line (if they are going in the right direction, of course). The finish line is what keeps runners moving in the right direction in a marathon, but it’s not the actual race.

So, even if a specific near-term goal seems not achievable, the process continues. If it’s the right thing to do, then the in-between work continues, regardless of outcome. We do the best we can, not knowing if we’ll succeed. We show up, and we do it intentionally, which is what hope really is—not something you have, but something you make. Hope is the basis for action.

Or, in the long run view, be like water.

Given the importance of in-between work, how can runners more thoughtfully and consistently incorporate it into what we do to address the climate crisis, as well as the democracy crisis. One example, already mentioned at the beginning of this post, is Sanctuary Runners (Ireland). Many other groups are also doing the work. The following is a partial list:

•          Goodgym (UK) - “GoodGym helps you get fit by doing good. We’re a group of runners, walkers, and cyclists who combine regular exercise with helping our communities.”
•      EcoAthletes (global) - “An experienced team of athletes and academics, climate scientists and ecopreneurs, green business leaders and journalists, devoted to identifying & equipping the Jackie Robinsons and the Megan Rapinoes of the climate crisis to lead climate action”
•         The Green Runners (UK) - “Runners who love the environment and Environmentalists who love to run”
•         Runners for Public Lands (U.S.) - “We empower runners to protect public lands, engage in climate action, and expand access to nature for all.”
•         Sport4Climate (global) - “The Sport4Climate initiative capitalizes on the universality of sport to unite athletes and fans alike in support of a sustainable future.”
•         Protect Our Winters (U.S.) - “We turn passionate outdoor people into climate advocates, working together to protect a future with clean air, clean water and a healthy planet.”
•         Running Out of Time (UK) - “an annual climate relay that raises awareness, inspires action and celebrates great climate campaigns, projects and events across Britain”

Running will be part of the solution to get us over to the other side and to then build something better. Timothy Snyder, in his recent piece, “Running together,” told a story about a 5K race in Toronto that he and his daughter signed up for that turned out to be a scam. No starting line, no finish line, no bibs, no officials, no volunteers, nothing, nada. It was freezing; it was snowing. Then, someone suggested that they could run the 5K anyway. Everyone nodded and quickly self-organized: start and finish line, out-and-back course, turnaround point. Without bibs, there was no timing and no “official competition”--though, of course, there’s always an element of competition (!). The runners’ paces, as typical, varied, so they got to the finish line over a period of many minutes. But, “[e]very runner who had finished had waited, forming two lines, one on each side of the path, to offer congratulations as finishers passed between.” That must have been so wonderful to see.

Was it a race? Did it matter? This impromptu 5K still served as a milepost, a measure of one’s running progress, a measure of the process. This 5K also revealed that, when circumstances change, when the structure of relationships changes, behaviors change. The scammed runners became, for a time, a community looking out for each other.

Maybe runners are different, maybe not. But, this 5K story reminded me of Rebecca Solnit's A Paradise Built in Hell in which she wrote in the Epilogue: "Disaster reveals what else the world could be like." Fooled by a digital scam is not the kind of disaster Solnit wrote about, but that even such a mini-disaster reveals what could be surely warms the heart and bodes well.