I remember running my first 10K years ago in Los Angeles’ Chinatown with a close friend. I hadn’t trained as much as I should have, but I felt good about finishing the race. My friend had been very consistent with her training schedule, running several times every week. At the start, she insisted on staying with me and running at my pace, but I encouraged her to go ahead and run her best race. As I ran on my own, something clicked: I needed to run my own race at my own pace.

Just as in a physical race, we run the race of life set before us at our own pace, and we do so with the knowledge that we are not alone.