If you read my previous post you know I learned a lot about the sport of running at the Blueridge Marathon last weekend, but I also learned some important life lessons on those mountains that day.

The Blueridge Marathon in Roanoke, VA is known as “America’s Toughest Road Marathon” because of it’s 7,430 foot elevation change as it winds up and down the mountains surrounding Roanoke.

If you’ve been around this blog very long, you know I hate running hills. But over the last year I’ve been learning to love the hills and learning a lot of life lessons in the process.

After the start, the first 8 miles or so were straight uphill. As we trudged up the mountain I wondered who the heck thought it would be a good idea to put a marathon in the mountains. I also wondered what had possessed my husband to register us for this race.

Oh, these hills had a LOT on us. But in the end, we got ’em.

Each time we rounded a curve in the road I prayed the road would level off, but each time it was just more uphill. About the time I thought I couldn’t go on any longer, the trail that had wound treacherously up the mountain for the last several miles finally began to level off. As we rounded one final curve, I literally gasped.

What lay before my eyes was the most spectacular view I’d ever seen. The valley was bathed in rays of sunshine as if God himself had stroked the sky with splendor. The trees were a lush carpet of green fit for a king. The mountains stood majestically on the other side of the valley as faithful soldiers protecting the inhabitants below. I stood there for several minutes and drank it in.

This picture doesn’t begin to do justice to the views that greeted us at the top.

Yes, I know what all my non-running friends are thinking…”Hello, you could have driven to the top of the mountain and seen the same view.” Yes, we could have driven to the top of the mountain. And yes, we would have looked across the same valley, with the same tiny buildings below, and the same mountains on the other side. But the view would have been entirely different.

You see, there’s something that completely alters the view when it takes work to get to the top…when it was sheer gut, grit, and determination that earned that view…when seeing that view required standing at the bottom of a seemingly insurmountable obstacle and tackling it one grueling step at a time.

There’s something about that view that’s more breathtaking, more beautiful, more awe-inspiring when we have to earn it.

No, that view wouldn’t have looked anything like the view we saw if we’d driven to the top.

Neither would the view of our lives if they were always easy…if we always got to take the easy way to the top of the mountains…if we could just skip the uphill and enjoy the view from the top…

So what mountains have you already traversed? What views have you seen that you never would have seen if you’d hadn’t trudged one step at a time to the top?

Or what mountains are you standing at the bottom of just wishing you could catch a ride to the top? Hang on for the journey.  It’s going to be one tough journey. You’ll want to quit…at least 100 times. Don’t. I guarantee the view from the top is going to be worth the effort.