One more kilometre

There is a particular kind of runner on the evening track in Muscat, and once you notice him you see him everywhere.

He started running to feel better. Then he started counting. Then the rule arrived, quietly: tonight has to be one more than last night. One more kilometre, a few seconds faster, one more lap than the man in the blue shirt. Some nights it works. Most nights he limps home having beaten yesterday by a whisker and enjoyed none of it.

The trouble with that rule is that it has no end. There is no night on which one more stops being required. Every win simply sets the bar for the next one, and the bar only moves in one direction.

The same habit runs through far more than running. One more hour at the desk than the colleague who left at six. One more follower than last month. A slightly bigger number in the account than the cousin who just bought a car. Each step on its own looks reasonable, and sometimes the push is useful. It gets people up in the morning.

But a contest against yourself that never ends has only one possible loser, and it is the person running it. Beating someone else is at least a race with a finish line. Beating yesterday, every single day, is not a race at all.

The runners who seem happiest on that track are the ones who know their distance, run it, and go home. They are not less ambitious. They simply decided what enough looks like.

Enough is almost always closer than it seems. It is reachable, it can be kept, and it is far more useful than one more.