Does Suffering Set You Free?

Posted on January 7, 2014 by Callie Skokos

Lately, when I leave the house for my run, a wave of guilt washes over me.  For me, running is a reminder of my freedom – both physically and mentally.  Today, I am fortunate.  Today I can run because I am not tethered by debilitating anxiety, physically-draining emotional issues, or heart-wrenching suffering. But, my neighbor Galina, who lives in the ‘sad house,’ is.  As I swing my legs in the pointless pursuit of warming up, I wonder how she feels when she sees me getting ready to go.  I imagine that she’s thinking, “If only my heart didn’t ache so fiercely and the tears didn’t flow so easily, then maybe I too could go outside – even just to take a walk and breathe in the cold air.” Galina’s son took his own life in October.  Her suffering is like nothing I have ever experienced.

It’s only been three months, but for Galina and her husband every day must feel like a hundred – with every minute consumed by a hurt that no one will ever understand.  I know I can’t. So the first time I went to express my condolences and check in on them, I said practically nothing.  I stammered.  I sobbed.  I said I was sorry over and over.  I had no words that could possibly take away their suffering.  On that first visit, I walked home wiping my tears feeling helpless and confused.  Why does this happen?  I am in the midst of rekindling my relationship with God and this is what He puts in front of me?

Some people are presented with signs all the time.  I believe I am one of those people.  But during the last 10 years, having lost almost all my faith, I thought these signs were produced by energy, or positive thinking, or were just the workings of a random universe.  However, when I received my second book from Pastor Tullian Tchividjian entitled, Glorious Ruin:  How Suffering Sets You Free, only days after questioning why bad things happen to good people, I knew I needed to give God another chance.

Breaking the silence of suffering

Breaking the silence of suffering

I had really just met Pastor Tullian a few months earlier through blogs and email.  He was a virtual stranger who instinctively knew what I was going through.  Whether it was by chance or divinity, I was getting more hopeful. I mean, if someone I had just met could sense my struggles and take action, maybe I could too.  Maybe this book was the key to helping Galina – a self-help book of sorts with a guaranteed 10-step program to show us all how to get up, get moving, and get on with life.  Honestly, I was relieved to find out it wasn’t.  After all, I am the more emotional variety of human being and I know that following instructions from a book, or in a program, or from a manual can never extract the pain.

Tullian gets it.  He seems to innately understand the human spirit – what will draw us close and what will push us away.  His preaching and his faith seem different than anything I’ve ever heard, or read, or experienced.  His books are an extension of his sermons – heartfelt, realistic, empathetic, and engaging.  When he writes, he is just as broken and imperfect as the rest of us.  He doesn’t try to explain why bad things happen to good people, but instead, provides his own insight into how suffering can liberate us.

After I read Glorious Ruin, I felt better about my initial visits with Galina.  It became clear that she wasn’t looking for answers from me or an explanation that would miraculously delete her pain.  So, on my third visit, I simply stood in the doorway and asked how she was.  With tears glistening on my lower lashes, I waited for her to speak. When she said nothing, I just hugged her.  Then, we both cried.  We had broken the silence of the suffering.  I think she just needed someone to stand beside her and suffer with her.

I was raised to believe that showing emotion was akin to being weak. “Never wear your heart on your sleeve.”  So, I run when I am sad, lonely, hurt or confused.  Through Tullian, I’ve learned that we don’t have to run from the pain.  We can learn from it and grow from it – whether it’s our suffering or someone else’s.  Suffering can bring us closer to grace and to God.  And that’s because He will always be there to suffer with us and to suffer for us.

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Running from the Ruin

Posted on December 29, 2013 by Callie Skokos

I act like I’m intently setting my running watch, but I’m actually looking over at my neighbor’s house.  It’s the sad house.  That’s what Keegan calls it and I understand why.  Its windows are dark and lifeless, while the front entrance is constantly shadowed, icy, and still.  No one appears to live there anymore.  While it seems to be vacant, two people do live there – devastated and suffering from ruin.

I am tempted to skip my run and instead knock on the lonely door and ask Galina if she would like to take a walk.  Just walk. Truthfully, I really want her to run.  I think if I was suffering the way she is, I would never stop running.  I would just run as fast and as hard as I could – until the physical pain put an end to the emotional pain.  I always say that running is the panacea for all that ails me.  But, today I’m not sure.  Maybe I would never, ever run again.  Maybe I would just sit alone and cry and grieve and throw things and weep and ask why over and over.  I don’t know how I would cope.  I just don’t.

I look at their abandoned, snow covered vehicles and decide that I should start running before I start crying.  It’s another glorious December morning – very cold but brilliantly sunny.  Today, I don’t really feel like running in the cold but I know it will help me put things in the right place in my head and heart.  I think back on the day in early October when Keegan broke the news.  His friend, a first semester freshman at CU, was found dead in his dorm room one evening before dinner.  It was suicide.  The first words from my mouth, before the tears, were, “Why?”  Then, “Oh my God, his poor parents.  What will they do now? How will they ever live through this?”

I’m only one mile into my wet, slushy run and I already want to stop.  After years of running, I know that running heavy with emotion is exhausting.  But I cannot shake the memory of how frightened and confused Keegan looked as I tried to hold back the tears to ask how he’s coping. What does he need?  The filmstrip of my mind clicks to the next frame and I’m remembering my first visit to the sad house in mid-October.  I had a card – which seems so pointless now – that acted as a prop during my pathetic one-minute monologue in which I said nothing but how sorry I was as my lip quivered and my eyes welled up.  I felt so small.  I had nothing to offer.  There were no words that could take away their suffering.

Even though the run is taking me downhill, all I want to do is stop and sob on the side of the road and let the snow-melt carry my tears down the storm drain.  I take a deep breath and let go a little.  Recently, I am learning that I do not have to carry all the burden.  I think about the last few months, the serendipitous events that led me to Pastor Tullian Tchividjian, the first book he sent me called “One Way Love:  Inexhaustible Grace for an Exhausted World,” and the spiritual journey that is helping me find my way back to God. Splashing along the wet road, I’m watching my shadow and focusing on how it feels to have someone beside me as I take this journey.  I’ve got a new running companion.

On the second visit, Galina opened the lonely door and stared through me as I mumbled something about my sadness for her and then handed her a Healing Bear.  I said almost nothing and she said almost nothing.  But then, before she closed the door, she quietly said, “Please, whatever you do, always talk to your children.”  When I stepped off the threshold, I could hardly see and I looked up at the sky and whispered, “Oh God, yes, I will always talk to my children. You have my word.” I’m standing in the cold and I’m praying.  Why should anyone have to suffer like this?  Why do some people have to hurt so much? How am I supposed to help her?

I’m still playing back that day in my mind when I return home from the run.  The sun is still bright in the sky and I raise my face and look directly into it.  I’m glad I took the run and feel a little less confused – but I still have so many questions about why people have to suffer and how to help those suffering and what to do with my own suffering.   Then, I almost trip over a small package left on my doorstep by the US Postal Service.

Inside is another book from Pastor Tullian entitled, “Glorious Ruin: How Suffering Sets You Free.”  I’m astonished and grateful.  Tullian knew nothing about Galina’s suffering or my inability to make sense of it or that I was incapable of helping her through it.  He only knew that I was lost and needed help finding my way – and it all started with a morning treadmill run, one Tweet, and the gift of a stranger.  I don’t understand how this all came together.  I understand only that life is amazing and terrifying.  And so, my journey continues…

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I’ll Never Again Run Alone

Posted on December 20, 2013 by Callie Skokos

I walked out of the Invision Sally Jobe Radiology and Imaging Center into the warm Colorado sunshine and I was sure this day was the most beautiful day of all. On this December afternoon, I learned about Grace first hand. The results of my tests were negative – there was no cancer and I was free to go about and live my life.  Now what?  I thought, as I sat in my car with the windows down drenched in the feeling of cold air infused with intense sunlight.  I feel selfish for being one who was spared.  I feel humbled for being one who was spared.   I am conflicted. How do I share the news, especially when so many women I know and don’t know leave the radiology center with very different results?

So I just sit there, staring at the worn and faded white sticker on the car parked in front of me and let the tears come.  I look down at my lap so none of the passersby can see my pain and I focus on the tears as they form tiny, snowflake-like stains on my jeans.  Everything seems magnified.  Time has slowed down.  I am breathlessly praying.  But I’m not praying to God to thank Him for sparing me.  I’m praying to God because He was beside me.  For more than a decade, I was alone and without faith.  I was exhausted.  I was exhausted by the effort needed to be responsible for controlling it all – especially that which I could never possibly control.

This must be the most beautiful of all worlds

Surely this is the most beautiful world of all

This was so much bigger than me and I had to let go – give up control to, well, God I guess.  That’s what I was thinking the day after my initial diagnosis when I tried to run away from cancer.  On that run, I imagined that the unknown was nipping at my heels and I was barely keeping one step ahead of it.  Everything about my world was magnified on this run – much like it was when I sat in my car trying to make sense of the week’s events and every emotion overtaking me.  And I felt very small – like I could just slip in between the snow crystals glistening and gradually melting at the edge of the sidewalk.  Every footfall seemed to harmonize with my beating heart and rhythmic breath.  I finished the run feeling an odd sense of blessing.

That night, I wrote about it.  And when I did, I uncovered something unexpected.  I learned that on that run, I wasn’t running away from cancer as much as I was running toward God.  I gave up and gave in.  The rest was in His hands.  And, oh how good it felt not to be alone.  In the days that preceded the mammogram and ultrasound and my inevitable fate, I prayed, I ran, and I cried.  I did this all knowing that I had no control of the outcome, but I did have faith.  When Pastor Tullian shared my story, I felt the comfort of God in the pure kindness of total strangers who prayed for me and wrote to me.  This is what I believe Grace is and I will never forget how that feels.

I think I needed to go through this pain in order to truly understand – to understand what happened to my faith, to understand Grace, to understand that there is no shame in letting go, and to understand how beautiful this world truly is.  Today, I feel even more deeply for those suffering from the known and unknown, and for the cancer-stricken women I know and don’t know.  There are no written words to express how grateful I am for the support and prayers I received. This time, God chased me down and I’m really glad. I have a feeling I’ll never run alone again.

[Heartfelt thanks to Pastor Tullian Tchividjian who knows no strangers.] 

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Please Don’t Let It Catch Me

Posted on December 10, 2013 by Callie Skokos

When I run, I can ease the pain.  When I run, I can control the controllable.  When I run, I can make sense of the senseless.  But when I run, can I defeat disease?  ‘They’ say all I have to do is lead a healthy lifestyle – eat right, exercise, don’t smoke, manage stress, be grateful, love and be loved.  Yes, I can do this especially since I have my running – the silver bullet that will allow me to constantly stay one step ahead of the debilitating.  Well, that’s what I thought until yesterday.

“Mmm hmmm…yes, there’s a palpable mass here.”  As if I’m inside a huge tin can, these words echo through the cold exam room as I stare past the doctor.  Right now, I’m simply a voyeur listening in on someone else’s bad news.  I’m now the cliché. “But doctor, I came in about the pain.  I didn’t think breast cancer presented in this way.” She was stoic.  No, we shouldn’t wait to have a mammogram until my annual exam in January.  Yes, I should schedule the appointment this week.  Maybe, things will be okay. This was yesterday.

Today, I don’t run in the cold, dark dawn. I feel betrayed by the run – my secret weapon in the defense against hardship, hurt, and hopelessness has failed.  I sip my coffee in a fog as my strong self argues with my weak self to get a grip.  I’ve been here before – during the end of my marriage, the death of my grandmother and the suicide of my closest friend.  When the internal arguing gets unbearable, my running shoes have always been the great mediator.  Let’s take this battle on the road.

It’s now noon and 37 degrees. The sun’s glare is reflecting off the snow and ice and I appreciate how Mother Nature has sprinkled glitter all around me.  My world already feels a bit kinder.  A palpable mass.  A mammogram. A mystery.  I know I cannot control these things, but I can control how I view them.  So I start my watch and begin the run up the slushy street.  My feet are soaked from the icy water in a matter of minutes and I feel like a child jumping in the rain puddles after a sun shower.  I pick up the pace in the cool slipstream while the splash-back from passing vehicles hits my legs and assures me that I am alive.

I envision that I’m being chased.  Maybe I can out-run this.  I think about my friend Deb who, only last year, was diagnosed with breast cancer.  She walked as a survivor in the Race for the Cure this September.  I don’t exactly know what she did to control the unknown, or how she quelled the arguments in her head, but I do know that she inspired.  She inspired her children, her husband, and her friends.  She didn’t run, but I do know that she won.  She beat cancer with the speed of treatment and the strength of heart.  So, I run faster and stronger.

I know I am not in control of this.  The God that I’m recently getting reacquainted with is in control of this.  I know that it’s presumptuous, but maybe if I show heart and spirit and self-awareness, I will be spared.  Oh, really?  I don’t really think it works that way.  The inner arguments continue as I am chased along my eight-mile route by the unknown nipping at my heels.  By the time I get home, I am convinced of only one thing.  On the road, I see the world in a more beautiful light and gain a personal strength that allows me to face all that lies ahead.  No matter what, I am a runner.

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A Running Prayer

Posted on November 28, 2013 by Callie Skokos

I awake to my alarm at 6:15 a.m. and realize that today is Thanksgiving.  This fact doesn’t really change things – well, except that having a day off during the week in late November allows me to run in daylight when it’s not quite as frigid.  For that, I am thankful.  But to be perfectly truthful, I’m thankful for every day I wake up.  I’m thankful for every day I can stand and walk and run.  In a weird way, I feel like it’s my responsibility to run – to run for those who cannot.

As I’m heading up the first hill on Titan Road, I look to the east and wish the the sun wasn’t being so shy today.  Her rays are slowly peeking out from the cloud-scattered horizon and with each ray that the clouds randomly release, I feel a little warmer and a little lighter.  I think about how incredible it is that the sun rises every day to brighten and warm our lives.  For the first time in 10 years, I think about God.

Until the age of 14, I knew no religion.  My only experience was a few beautiful Sunday mornings where my Nana and Grampy would take me to the Presbyterian Church.  I was about 10 I think.  All I remember was that I got to sit in between the two most loving people I knew – engulfed in their smell, their touch, and their warmth.  When I was a second-semester Freshman, my parents randomly enrolled me in St. John Vianney Catholic High School. I had no school-issued uniform and no understanding of God.  Secretly, I asked one of my grade-school friends if she would write down all the prayers we had to recite before every class.  I memorized them like a champ.  But, I still knew no God.

By high school graduation, I was Catholic – at least in my heart.  I prayed.  I volunteered.  I cared about those less fortunate.  But, according to every Catholic, I was not Catholic in God’s eyes because I had not completed the seven sacraments.  I was not yet disillusioned by their views.  I continued to go to Mass, to pray to a God that I was still trying to understand, and baptized my first child in the Catholic Church.  But, I was not at peace.  I could not make sense of God.  Religion, I understood.  I understood the community of the church, and loved it.  I understood that people needed hope and healing and help in so many ways.  What I didn’t understand was how God was responsible for this.

But running today makes me wonder how all of THIS is possible – the peacefulness of the morning, the vast plains on the east, and the mysterious mountains on the west.  I understand the science of the universe but everyone always says there’s something more to its formation.  Today, I wonder if there is.  My story and the unanswered questions flip through my mind like an old-fashioned movie reel as I head back down my final hill.  The sun is completely covered by the clouds now and it feels much colder.  Then, the movie of my mind focuses in on the recent serendipitous events that led me to Pastor Tullian Tchividjian, grandson of Reverend Billy Graham.

It was a Friday morning in October and I was running on the treadmill.  “Morning Joe” was on the TV screen above my head.  I don’t usually watch TV when I run, but something made me look up and a segment called “Faith on Fridays” caught my attention.   Pastor Tullian was being interviewed about his latest book called, “One Way Love:  Inexhaustible Grace for an Exhausted World.”  He spoke about Grace – defined for laymen as “unconditional love – the love of God.”  His message, although much more eloquent, is that a relationship with God provides a love with no conditions.  He talked about how exhausted we are as a society and how understanding God’s Grace can help set us free – if we believe.

I was intrigued.  I sent Tullian a Tweet about the show and within a day, he had written me and asked me to provide him with my address so he could send me a book.  We had several email exchanges that were so hopeful that I couldn’t wait to get the book.  As I write this, I am reading it – slowly.  I’m reading every word and re-reading what I don’t get.  I’m taking notes and trying to understand a God that I’ve never met.

By the time I am a half-mile from home where the kids will be rubbing the dreams from their eyes and the coffee will still be hot, I am saying a prayer.  I notice the rhythm of my footfalls as I silently thank the world or the universe or maybe God for my life – for all the laundry that’s piled up, for all the dishes I need to put away, for the vacuuming that I’ve been putting off, and for all the emails that I’ve yet to answer.  I open my front door and breathe deeply.   I am blessed to have it all.

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I Am Not Afraid

Posted on November 13, 2013 by Callie Skokos

The wind is whipping from all directions as Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” blares from the speakers at the base of the Verrazano–Narrows Bridge.  In about two minutes, my wave will make its way to the official starting line and I’ll be running my second NYC Marathon.  I really need to get moving. I’m shivering, although I’m not entirely sure whether it’s nerves or the wind swirling in off the harbor. This is my first marathon since the horrific events of the 2013 Boston Marathon and the impact of that senseless violence is everywhere I turn. I realize now that I no longer believe in the freedom of the run.

Along with the freedom of the run, two terrorists stole lives and limbs and love ones.  Because of two terrorists, thousands of officers from the NYPD are positioned at the entrance to Port Wadsworth in Staten Island where 50,000 runners will wait, warm up, and meditate for hours before their wave start. Marathoners and organizers call this Athlete’s Village.  But on this day, I don’t feel that comforting and familiar sense of athletic camaraderie that makes the marathon so exceptional.  We are no longer one. As stoic officers scrutinized our bags and watched us like hawks, I felt an uncomfortable sense of distrust among us.  The feelings were magnified as we each entered the metal detectors that were temporarily erected in a suburban neighborhood I can imagine is usually quiet and half-asleep at this time on any other Sunday.

I’m jogging in place waiting for the runners in front of me to start moving forward and I feel the charm on my silver chain bounce up and down.  I touch it and mouth the words that are etched on the front and back.  “I am not afraid.  I was born to do this.”  I bought the charm when I learned that Kara Goucher, one of my American long-distance running idols, had the same charm and repeated this mantra when she raced.  I’ve worn the necklace on some of my hardest training runs and found myself quietly repeating the words over and over when my physical strength needed a boost that it could only get from my heart.  I believe heart is what you run on when your legs have nothing left.

Medal and Mantra

Medal and Mantra

But I’ve learned that running in fear is worse than having never trained at all. It’s crippling. “I am not afraid. I am not afraid,” I whisper.   And then, I am shaken and startled by the explosion – like the first explosion in Boston it is a force that shakes me from the ground up.  I audibly gasp but realize within an instant that it’s merely the starting cannon.  I look around quickly to see if I am the only one shaken by this harsh reminder.  I cannot understand why anyone in the NYC Marathon organization would approve a cannon’s explosion as the official race start of a race riddled with high security and painful memories.

Finally, I’m running.  The rattled nerves and anxiety start to leave my body and I breathe in deeply.  I try to smile and almost giggle as I fall into step with thousands of other runners working our way up the awe-inspiring double-decked suspension bridge that connects the boroughs of Staten Island and Brooklyn.  I look to my left and there is an NYPD helicopter watching over us and runners are stopping, waving and taking pictures.  I wave too and smile – really smile.  I feel thankful that I’m here and that our country is strong and resilient and brave.  I am proud of myself and the other 50,000 runners who trained for this to prove that no one can steal our freedom from us – even if it’s just a 26.2 mile run through the five boroughs of NYC.

There is a special place in my heart for the entire NYPD, the countless volunteers and medics, and the thousands of spectators who turned this race into something much more. For me, they made this my freedom run.  And, I am no longer afraid.  I was born to do this.

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Pretty in Pink

Posted on October 22, 2013 by Callie Skokos

It is still nighttime-dark and very quiet at 5 a.m. on this Sunday, September 29.  But waking up seems unusually easy.  You see, today instead of getting ready to run my long Sunday training run in preparation for the upcoming NYC Marathon, I am putting on all the pink and girly clothes I can find – pink t-shirt, pink fur-collared sweater,  and pink gloves. The pièce de résistance is the pink tulle tutu.  If there is anything that makes you feel like a girl, I’m here to tell you that there’s nothing like a tutu.

On this day, I am not a runner.  I’m a hater and a lover.  Today, I hate cancer.  But today, I also join thousands of others in the Race for the Cure who love their neighbors, and their sisters, and their coworkers, and all the women who wear pink hats to cover the scars of chemotherapy.  Today, I won’t run.  I will walk, and skip, and dance and reflect, and believe that all of us together can make a difference.

My team, “Deb’s Bosom Buddies,” arrives to pick me up at 5:30 a.m. for the pilgrimage to downtown Denver.  The team is Deb, our breast cancer survivor and inspiration, her husband and ultimate rock, their three teenagers and their two friends.  We are a motley crew in Race for the Cure tee-shirts, multi-hued pink tights, pink knee socks, pink ribbons, pink face paint, and pink boas.  We are ready to use the power of pink to kick cancer’s stupid butt.  This is our rally cry.

Pretty (and powerful) in Pink

We arrive at the Pepsi Center and I look around at our crew.  Everyone is smiling and jumping up and down and acting giddy.  It doesn’t matter that our Bosom Buddy teenagers probably got only a few hours of sleep or that their friends will probably be lounging around in their jammies until noon.  I am swept up by the energy of these kids who care so deeply for the mom who fought for her life to be with them today.  They wouldn’t miss this moment to be with her and celebrate her survivorship – even if it means being downtown before dawn.

We’re taking pictures of ourselves doing silly things and kissing Deb and hugging each other.  I’m laughing and then I’m crying.  We are walking and skipping and dancing the 5K route, all the while reading the inspirational signs and tributes to those who lost their lives to breast cancer.  I cannot get ahold of my emotions, but you know, I guess that’s what it means to be alive.  I am so grateful to be alive today and among so many caring, spirited, life-loving human beings.

Deb is our rock star and we are her groupies, so we post pictures on Facebook to forever document this day and share our pink power – and maybe even change one person’s mind about how they can make a difference in this world. This is a fight we can win if we keep up the momentum and remember that there is nothing more attractive than fighting like a girl.

[If you have a loved one suffering with cancer and in need of a Healing Bear, please reply to this post.]

 

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A Mid-Summer’s Nightmare

Posted on August 21, 2013 by Callie Skokos

The cave is musty and damp and dark.  I cannot make out the other people – just shapes in the shadows – but there are dozens.  All I know is that I should feel scared but strangely, I am unusually calm.  Although I cannot see her, there is a woman among us who is not an actual physical presence but exudes incredible power.  In a hypnotic voice she is telling us how we must carry out our mission – step by graphic step.  The mission of which she speaks is mass suicide.

This was my nightmare on August 15, 2013. In the dream, I remember thinking that this all seemed wrong, but extremely necessary.  Oddly, I am at peace with my impending fate and resolved with my decision.  I’ve am convinced that it is in the best interest of society and humanity.  Time passes, which is strange and altered in a dream state, and within an instant, I have incredible clarity.  As if I’ve awaken from the dream within a dream, I shout out, “McKenna!”  I stand up and I cry, “I cannot do this!  What about my daughter McKenna?  How can I do this to her?  How will she live without me?”

And then, I awake in reality.  The digital clock glows 3: 14 a.m.  It was a dream.  I am relieved to hear the wind through my open windows and see the light of the three-quarters moon shining through the sheer curtains.  I think about McKenna and Jack and Keegan – my children – and I semi-lucidly weep until I’m back to sleep.  My alarm wakes me at 5:00 a.m. and it’s still dark, but I know that if I get up and run and run, I might be able to shake the ominous feeling that blankets me.  So I lace up and head out.

As I run in the pre-dawn darkness, all I want to do is jettison this feeling of dread.  Why would I dream such a dream?  What is going on in my head?  What is wrong in my heart?  I didn’t come to any conclusions or find peace that morning, but after my run I did feel like I was in a better mental state.  I had regained some control and was less anxious.  But the image of this woman-deity haunted my thoughts for days.  Her voice came to me at odd times and the nagging feeling of desperation was just below the surface of my consciousness.

Much like running, writing became my release.  Re-creating the dream in words allowed me to dig into the mystery behind the dream and the significance hidden in the unconscious.  Then, it slowly becomes clear.  The nightmare incorporated the disturbing concepts of the occult, suicide, darkness and death to shake me up and open my eyes to what I am missing in the waking world.  It wasn’t about me being unhappy or suicidal, which was my initial reaction and fear.  It was about me misunderstanding one very human need.

The message was this: I couldn’t commit the act because McKenna couldn’t live without me.  In the dream, McKenna represents all the people in my life whom I love and who love me back. I am needed.  It was a wake-up call to make me remember that I need to be here on this earth because I mean something.  If you are like me, who believes that the more you do, the more you matter, please take note.  We are not loved by what we do, how we do it, how much we do and how well we do it.  We are loved because we are.  We deserve to be in this world for no other reason than to simply exist.  Weird.  No Academy Award or Nobel Peace Prize or Olympic gold medal required.

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Running Skirt Reboot

Posted on May 25, 2013 by Callie Skokos

RunningPretty is more than just a skirt

Marketing.  It’s what I’m supposed to be good at.  I’ve studied it, made a pretty decent career out of it, and really enjoy it.  So why am I so terrible at putting it into practice with my own endeavors?  I guess mainly I’m referring to my blog. This one – Running Pretty, Writing Real.  I started this blog as a way to share my story about RunningPretty.  It was intended to be a typical marketing tool.  You know the drill:  write a post about the product, spread the word through social networking, attract readers, link to a website, get them to click, sell product.  Then, sit back and watch the company grow.

In my case, the social networking approach was slightly different.  I wanted to use my blog to build the RunningPretty brand in a personal way.  The strategy was to connect to just one reader who believed that my company was worth the investment.  If you know my RunningPretty story, you know I need an investor – or at least a business person who can appreciate my journey, and wants to be a partner in a start-up that was built to benefit women and nurture our spirit.  I’ve got some entrepreneurial colleagues who are likely reading this and shaking their heads.  I’m sure they believe this is a pathetic daydream that will get me nowhere and have, in fact, shared this opinion with me many times in the kindest way possible.

On my worst days, I believe them.  I should just give up.  Pack it in.  Accept the fact that this effort is futile after six years and no actual product sales. But, on my good days, I remember what RunningPretty has done for me.  On paper, RunningPretty is a losing proposition, but there are so many things in life that cannot be measured monetarily.  RunningPretty came to me at a time in my life where I was invisible – completely and utterly unseen by everyone.   I was a stay-at-home mom generating more than half the family income running a creative services business at night.  Most of my clients had never met me thanks to the virtual business world, I rarely saw my friends and I spent no time with my husband.  Late one night, this thought shook me hard:  If I disappeared right now, would anyone notice?

Time to change your mind.  You have had ideas.  You are creative.  Have faith in yourself.  Forget it.  I’m not smart enough.  I’ll surely fail.  Stop it.  You can do whatever you set your mind to.  Maybe.  Okay, yeah.  Oh, I don’t know.  Welcome to “Callie’s Mental Monologue.”  Damn, I was falling fast.  It was time to move.  So, I resurrected an idea I had from a few years back – an idea that was prompted by body-conscious self-esteem issues and a desire to run safely and confidently.  It was sink or swim.  I dove in head first.

Bam. It was as if I hit the hard reboot.  Day 1:  Envision. Research. Sketch. Hang out at the fabric store with Kindergarteners in tow.  Talk to everyone.  Buy pattern-making materials.  Share my vision.  Find contacts.  Leave with dozens of fabric swatches and business cards.  Dream.  Sleep. Repeat. It’s an incredible feeling of power when you take control of what is in your control.  I found peace that day.  It was in the form of hope.  Without that hope, I was just a ghost – desperate and invisible.

Since the big reboot, I learned about accounting for the small business.  I dug deep and found the courage to pitch RunningPretty – selling my vision and speaking in public.  I bartered.   I wrote catalog copy for a local clothing company in return for overseas manufacturing knowledge and China-made prototypes.  I filed a patent application, a modified patent application, a provisional patent, and a trademark application.  I learned how to do a lot with a little – little money and even less time.  Hidden by my own insecurities, however, was that which I did have.  I had a core of good people who were cheering me on from the sidelines – in a silent, sort of “waiting for Callie to wake up” kind of way.  I’m really glad I woke up.

RunningPretty also gave me this – the courage to write this blog.  Sure, it’s a really poor marketing tool, but it’s proven to be a really priceless way to connect with others in a more meaningful way.  After all, what is the RunningPretty brand?  It’s a feeling of power.  It’s a desire to achieve.  It’s hope for the next run.  It’s a chance at starting something new.  And, while I may only have four followers and a couple dozen regular readers, I’ve learned that if my words resonate with just one person who closes their laptop that day and says, “I feel better now,” then RunningPretty is not a losing proposition after all.

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You are the Good

Posted on May 17, 2013 by Callie Skokos

That night, I crawled into bed, stretched out my aching legs, and scrolled through my text messages.  Even though I had tried to respond to each one of them as soon as I could, I wanted to re-read them all.  I think over 60 text messages chimed in my pocket within 15 minutes of the first explosion on Boylston Street and dozens more came in as the day wore on.  Then, I re-read every email and Facebook post.  When I checked the time, I realized that I had been reliving the day’s events for over an hour.  I switched off my phone and drifted into a deep sleep feeling the comfort of friendship like the warm, soft blanket that I had tucked against my cheek.

There will always be people in the world who do bad things.  I honestly cannot fathom what makes a person open fire in a movie theater, gun down their classmates, or plant two bombs at the finish line of the world’s most prestigious marathon.  It is incomprehensible to me and I’ve seen enough.  When I returned from the shaken and somber city of Boston, I was exhausted emotionally and physically.  I was also very conflicted.  I had not been hurt.  I had finished the race.  My family and children were safe.  At that moment, it felt wrong to be grateful for all the friends who cared for me and content with my accomplishment.  I didn’t know how to correctly respond to anyone’s inquiries and I wasn’t sure how to even tell my story.

“Mommy, why does it seem like the violence is getting closer and closer to us every day?” asked my 10-year-old son Jack after I had settled in at home.  I was speechless and perplexed – painfully realizing that Jack had also become a victim of the violence even though he was thousands of miles away in Colorado.  Again, I wasn’t sure how to respond.  When I found my words, I said, “I don’t know, honey, but I do know that it will all be okay.  We just have to have faith.  The good will always be stronger than the bad.”  And, my words were actually sincere.  I mean, I felt it – especially when I was inundated with an outpouring of love manifested in all forms of communication on such a horrific day.

Thank you my friends

Out of the bad, comes the good.  Re-reading texts from childhood friends brought back wonderful memories of my youth.  Emails from my co-workers made me recognize that I am valued for the work that I do and the contributions I make.  Calls from friends with whom I had lost touch immediately rekindled those relationships.  And, being with my older brother in the chaos allowed each of us to share our feelings in ways that otherwise would have been uncomfortable and awkward – establishing what I believe will now be an unbreakable bond.  For weeks afterwards, I had emotional conversations with so many people – some whom I didn’t know well but now do, some who were strangers but provided remarkable insight, and some who went through what I did and are now a new connection with prospects for a future friendship.

I am no longer conflicted and I owe that to you.  My friends.  You were there for me in so many ways – with your hugs, your comforting words, your regular check-ins.  Out of the bad, comes the good. This terrible experience confirmed what I knew in my heart all along.  It confirmed my belief that if we all stick together in this often hurtful world, we will get through it with less scars and more smiles.  Like I said to Jack, the good will always be stronger than the bad.  You are the good.  And the good will always outnumber the bad.

Let’s show the victims of the Boston bombings exactly what the good looks like by raising much-needed funds for the Boston Children’s Hospital. 

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