The hardest thing to do is to go from zero to one.
Toronto Marathon
It is a truth universally acknowledged that teenage boys, in possession of what they think is the world's most sound set of judgements, must be in want of someone to always tell them how brilliant they are. Always. In the years that puberty ravages their bodies they believe all is known, nothing is to be learned, and the “advice” of adults is nothing but a lifeless gasp from flailing, regretful meat-sacks who have fallen prey to the trappings of the world.
I was such a teenage boy.
As I grew up in the southern states of Australia, spending the days under the hot summer sun and cold winter clouds, I was often one to believe that I had learned all there was to learn. I held the knowledge I needed to make every correct decision. I knew what I liked, what I didn’t like, and there was nothing that the experience of others could teach me that I couldn’t teach myself.
So, one day, when my father made a single comment as we watched our favourite sport together, I barely listened to him. I smiled, nodded, and continued living in my teenage-boy world with my teenage-boy brain, paying no further thought to what he said to me.
But that day, there was weight to his words.
Somehow, what he said burrowed into my brain. It set as a memory that lay dormant in hibernation within the dark recesses of my mind. Over time the comment evolved. It gestated slowly and secretly into a lesson I didn’t think I needed; provided an answer to a question I was yet to think of asking. It survived the later horrors of puberty and adolescence, only to emerge decades later as a spark for something greater.
The comment was barely anything.
But it was the start of everything.
It was the lesson of Zero to One.
A Spark
I was twelve years old when my dad sat with me, shoulder-to-shoulder, and we watched down upon a brutal scene from seats high in stadium stands.
Thirty-six players tumbled, fumbled and stumbled all over each other on a large oval of freshly-mown grass. Their arms were as thick as tree trunks and their thighs squeezed out of the shortest of shorts, yet they were fast, agile and strong. They fought violently for the possession of a simple leather balloon, pushing hard against their opponents in the pack, exerting all of their will to protect it from the others like it were the most precious jewel in the existence. Should any of them somehow extract themselves from the thrashing pile of bodies, weave through the next set of waiting predators and kick the ball through two posts that reached high up into the sky, their team would be rewarded with six beautiful, glorious points, and the whole thing would begin again from the middle in an endless loop of carnage.
This was Australian Rules Football, and we loved it.
Today, though, was special: there were some new kids on the block. Still fresh from the bruise-free schoolboy competitions, they had finally been thrown into their first ever games against ferocious, professional men. Lanky, young and inexperienced, we watched helplessly as they were crushed from every angle, tackled at each instant and battered from siren-to-siren by the hardened veterans of the sport. To say they struggled was an understatement, and it was plain for all to see on the world’s biggest stage.
I’ll never know what was going through my dad’s head in this moment as he watched the match. Perhaps it was the struggle of them clawing away at their first (and potentially last) opportunity that resonated with him. Whatever it was, it caused him to suddenly say the following words that would change my life decades later:
“Angus, the most challenging thing that any of us can ever do in our life is to go from zero to one. We should always respect someone who has played just a single game of Aussie Rules, including these kids. Even if this is their last game ever, they got to one, and that’s all that matters. They made it, even if for a moment.”
I barely registered the words at the time. I just shrugged, said “Yeah,” and continued watching the carnage with ignorant glee. But little did I know the words had buried themselves within me until they I was ready to recall them again many, many years later.
Zero To One
Think about that thing you’ve always wanted to do one day. Go on, you know what it is. It’s that dream you keep telling your best friends. It’s that idea you mentioned on the first date. It’s that thing that pops into your head when you look in the mirror, nags at you and keeps you awake, and bubbles in your gut. Sometimes it sneaks away for a moment, maybe for weeks, months or years at a time, but it never truly leaves you and it always comes back.
One day, you tell yourself.
One day…
Now, think of all the reasons it hasn’t happened yet. You know what those are, too. They are the excuses you tell those same friends, the same date, and the same mirror. They are the pills that get you to sleep or ease your tummy. Every time the thing comes back, so do the reasons. The reasons are strong, powerful, effective and they keep us locked at zero.
I know them all. I had the same ones:
I don’t know where to start, and it’s better to wait until I know exactly what to do.
I don’t have the time yet, so I need to wait until the conditions improve.
Everybody else started ages ago so there is not point, they are way ahead of me.
When it comes to our dreams, One is not a number. It’s a threshold you cross from which you never return. It’s the ability to now say “Yes” when once you could only say “No”. It’s the first step forward. The first taste. The first word. The first note. It’s a code that lives within us. We’re written in binary, a natural dichotomy etched into our genetic makeup. Are we, as people, not just all a collection of whether we did or did not? Have or have not? Don’t our experiences – our ability to relate to each other – just come from whether we, too, tried it?
Are we not just made up of zeroes and ones?
One is a treasure. It’s a diamond behind a layer of solid doors and laser beams. It’s a secret to the universe protected by an almighty forcefield. From the outside it looks impenetrable, guarded by an all-menacing Voice that whispers into our ear all those reasons that are holding us back again and again and again. It seems impossible. It feels unobtainable, and if it were up to that voice in your head it will forever be locked away.
We all have the thing. We are all stuck at zero on something.
For me, that was running a marathon.
So when I clawed my way out of my teenage angst and emerged into the real world, I was confronted with a fundamental truth: I really didn’t know much at all. The world was more complicated than I had thought growing up, and accomplishments didn’t just get handed to me on a platter like I had expected. I always wanted to run a marathon, but I assumed it would just happen. I’d be ready one day, when I was older, and bigger, so I would just wait for that day to arrive.
So I grew older. And I got bigger. A decade passed, but still the day did not come. There was always a strong and logical excuse not to do it. The Voice in my head was my constant companion and it provided me with all of the right answers I needed to keep me at zero. When I turned thirty, I was more than convinced my body was still not ready for it. I didn’t know where to start, and it was truly a silly thing to desire.
And then the world changed. The COVID-19 pandemic hit us all in 2020, and the comfort zone I loved sitting in suddenly vanished. Our lives halted in their tracks. In the resulting isolation I was suddenly forced to look inward, truly, and realised I felt lost, aimless, and unfilled. I had lived on autopilot, a slave to the Voice in my head that dulled my desires and kept me steady on a directionless road.
Was I happy with where all the excuses had taken me?
I listened to the throbbing in my head, but the more I listened the more they started to change.
One day...
One day...
Zero...
Zero...
Zero...
And as I heard these words, the pandemic was showing me that I was truly one of the lucky ones. I had a rented apartment with heating. I had a bed. I had access to food, water, and sanitation. I had a job. I had friends and family I could connect with across the world.
I had taken it all for granted and now all of the excuses felt hollow.
The most challenging thing that any of us can ever do in our life is to go from zero to one...
A spark had been lit. I stepped down a new path. I started to look for others that had documented their running goals and rapidly found those who had accomplished remarkable feats. I learned the story of James Lawrence – the “Iron Cowboy” – as he completed two separate remarkable projects of 50 and 101 consecutive iron-distance triathlons. I encountered Canadian athlete Lisa Bentley, who had won many iron-distance triathlon championships alongside her lifelong cystic fibrosis. And then I discovered British adventurer Nick Butter, who had run a marathon in every country in the world and circumnavigated the entirety of Britain on separate record-breaking feats. As I absorbed their stories, devouring their adventures, there emerged a simple observation in all of them: They, too, were fighting the voice that tried stopping them from going to One.
Just like me.
And, as I imagine, just like you.
But they had all beaten it by taking a first step at the start of their journey, blindly, into the unknown. Their journeys all began the exact same way: by going from zero to one.
And so, on the 20th of March 2022, I stood alone at the corner of Yonge Street and Lakeshore in Toronto, Canada, to take the first steps in my very first marathon.
The Marathon
Yonge Street is thought to be the longest street in the world, and one end of it begins at its intersection with Lake Ontario. It was at this very point where my first marathon, and the entirety of the Hundred City Run, would begin. Toronto is well designed for running, and its lakeshore trail contributes just a small section to the 3,600-kilometre long Great Lakes Waterfront Trail.
My plan was to set off along the water in a simple “out-and-back”. I knew the trail well as it formed part of my usual training route, and so I felt mostly prepared for the terrain ahead. In fact, such was my familiarity with the route that it all felt a little unremarkable. It felt like another day, another run.
But it wasn’t just another day.
The sky was grey. The temperature (mild) and the wind (light) made for good running conditions. Armed with a running belt holding some water, some Gatorade, and an energy bar, I steeled myself for what lay ahead, all with the knowledge in my gut that I wasn’t really ready for what lay ahead.
But this wasn’t about being ready.
It was about going to one.
I took a step forward.
And then a second.
The journey began.
It’s difficult to describe a marathon. From outside it may seem like just one long, slow run, but it’s far more complex than that. Nothing stays consistent the whole way. Your mind and body are constantly mixing and changing, and any small variable can have a profound impact on the experience. A wrong step on a curb. A strong gust of wind, ahead or behind. A cramp in a muscle. A surge in energy. It's as if the longer you run, the more your mind and body becomes susceptible to the conditions.
In Aussie Rules, the game is played in quarters. Like a marathon, each quarter appears the same in theory (twenty minutes of play time each), but the reality is that each is truly different. Teams have different goals, measures and focuses according to which quarter they're in. They manage a long, strenuous journey by breaking it down into its components, taking it step-by-step, and focusing on smaller goals to hopefully get to the end with a win.
If I was going to get to the end of this journey, I had to think of it in the same way. I had to focus on its segments, set small, bite-sized targets, and trust that as long I kept going then I would reach the end at some point.
So that is how I approached the journey today.
First Quarter
The aim of the first quarter is to set the tone, get an early score, and establish the behaviours for how you want to play the rest of the game. In the first ten kilometres, I needed a strong, but steady start, so I set off at my usual training pace. I found a spot where I was breathing more heavily, though without the need to gasp for air, as I tried to bank the early kilometres.
At this time of morning there were more birds out than people, and so I felt like I had the trail to myself. I managed a smile a couple of times as I tried to soak in the surroundings, as this was the bit that I was used to. I usually ran around ten kilometres a day.
I reached the ten-kilometre mark around the Humber Bridge. The lake shined gorgeously on my left-hand side, despite the grey clouds above. It was a strong and steady start.
Second Quarter
This is where things started to go wrong.
Shooting pains started up my right hip, through my left knee, and on the soles of both feet. My body had now started informing me, quite abruptly I may say, that it was now extending itself further than it was used to. While it had tolerated my 10-kilometre training runs, we had now gone outside the boundaries of our agreement.
Anybody watching me would have seen a frown on my face. The first quarter had been simple. Wasn’t it supposed to stay that way? How was I going to run strong in this first marathon if I was having these sorts of pains so early? I wasn’t even halfway. I continued to press on, hoping the aches would vanish if I ignored them, a philosophy I had applied to many aspects of my life (new therapists, the line is already full, you’re going to have to wait your turn).
Now the pathway took itself away from the water’s edge and I spent some time slowly twisting and turning through suburban. I navigated the roadside trails, around parked cars and through a series of parks where, to my utmost surprise, I even stumbled upon the heavenly sight of Australian Rules Football posts: four sets of white goal posts stretching up into the air, the two outside posts smaller than the middle ones.
It was a sight I never thought I’d see this far from home, and I took it as a sign from the universe.
Spurred on with a new energy and purpose, I ploughed forward through the aches and returned to a pace rivalling the first quarter. As I crossed the 21.1-kilometre mark, over two hours since starting the journey, I found myself turning around at the most coveted of Canadian places: Tim Hortons.
Two signs in one day? I was a lucky man.
But the second surge had used a lot of energy. The pains in my feet had reached their peak, my knees were getting more difficult to bend, and I was low on water and Gatorade. In that moment, I was confronted with a simple reality: I now had to do it all again.
I started back home, ruing what was to come.
Third Quarter
In Aussie Rules, the third quarter is commonly referred to as the “premiership quarter”. The reason is a little strange but hear me out.
The third quarter is where the difficult games are won. It’s where you win on the “premiership” day (equivalent word for championship in the Australian sport). Not the final quarter, but the third. At this point in the match, if you can surge away from your opponent, showing them that you can do it all despite the exhaustion, you strike an enormous mental blow to their core.
I’ll put it another way, perhaps one more globally understood. Think of two runners who have been neck-and-neck through a race. They are exhausted, using each other to keep a pace, push through their aches and continue the fight. Suddenly, one runner surges ahead of their rival. It’s not gradual. It’s a fleeting moment, a sudden and immediate push against the pain.
If timed right, the opponent is crushed.
I have been in enough races myself to see this happen. I’ve been the one that surged, and the one that was crushed. It’s a well-known tactic, and the trick is to pick when the right time is for you to “go”. Too early and you’ll burn out and get caught. Too late and your opponent can often respond and catch you if they are faster. But time it just right, and the race is yours well before the finish line.
I was now in the third quarter, and today I had my butt kicked.
I got up to the 28th-kilometre before I started walk-run alternating, a tactic used by ultra-marathon runners (it is exactly how it sounds). I had problems all over my legs. Both of my left and right hamstrings could not extend all the way, horribly tight. The bottom of my feet shot pains up to my ankles with each running step. My right hip had seized, my left knee was locked straight, and I was now swaying side-to-side with each pace.
The problems from the second quarter had continued, worsening over 7 kilometres.
Run…
Walk…
Run…
Walk…
Walk…
Run…
Walk…
Walk…
Walk…
Run…
And then at 29-kilometres mark I finally I conceded. I stopped running entirely, and walking became the only mode of forward movement. I still had fourteen kilometres to go, and I was down to a hobble. I could see the CN Tower in the distance anchoring the Toronto city skyline, but it was so, so far away.
Final Quarter
There was one thing in my mind for the final ten kilometres of the marathon.
Don’t sit down.
I knew that as soon as I stopped, I wouldn’t start again. Sitting down meant the end, and that meant staying at zero. It was not an option. I focused my energy on every slow, limping step. I was approaching downtown again, the most densely populated part of the trail. There were benches everywhere, tempting me. I started salivating, longing for a cosy place to plant my aching butt.
Don’t sit down.
I was a mess. I noticed glances of concern from others as they passed me by on their casual walks, all of them much faster than me.
Don’t sit down.
At Coronation Park, my headphones gave out, and now I was down to just the sounds of nature. Unfortunately, in this part of Toronto, that mostly just meant traffic.
But I kept going.
Don’t sit down.
I couldn’t bend my knees anymore.
Don’t sit down.
In desperation I paused for but a moment, bending over briefly to stretch my back for the twentieth time in this return leg, and even that was hard enough to get going from again.
Don’t sit down.
The Voice appeared again. “Why are we doing this, Angus?” it asked me. “We were doing fine. We spent thirty years putting off all this pain. It was good. We were having fun, right?”
Don’t sit down.
“I’ll tell you what, let’s make a bargain. If you sit now, we’ll try again next week. You’ll be better prepared. How about that?”
Don’t sit down.
“You’re going to permanently damage your legs you know. This isn’t healthy. Your parents were right.”
Don’t sit down.
I crossed the CN Tower and looked at my watch.
42.0…
42.1…
42.2 kilometres.
And in an instant, the Voice was silent. In its place was the thumping sound of my heart, pounding a single word through my aching body.
One.
One.
ONE.
Reflection
There’s no way I could have ever predicted that a single remark from my father, cast out to the world in a flash of time, would totally change my life nearly twenty years later.
Absolutely no way in hell.
But it did, and so here we are today.
The universe has a strange, mystical way of coming full circle. Just like those kids playing their first professional games, I walked off from my first marathon battered and bruised, a newcomer to a world that so many others have mastered before me. It had taken me six hours to do it. Six miserable hours, absent of glory or glamour. I hadn’t powered through a finish line, arms outstretched, posing for cameras. There was nobody there to pat me on the back or hand me a banana and medal. Instead, I had hobbled over an imaginary line tired, sore and alone.
“The most challenging thing that any of us can ever do in our life is to go from zero to one.”
It was ugly, but I got it done.
I have now run a marathon.
I am now on One.
So today, I hope you join me. Take that “one day” and turn it into today. Go from zero to One. It will probably be nothing near the experience you hoped for, or expected, but that’s not what this is about. Nothing can come to you until you go from zero to one, and so today is the day to make that step.
Write one song, even if it sounds silly.
Craft one poem, even if it makes absolutely no sense.
Try one recipe, even if it tastes awful.
Knit one glove, even if it doesn’t fit.
Attempt one five-kilometre walk, no matter how long it takes you.
Set one moment aside to meditate, no matter how challenging it feels.
Make one donation, even if you feel it contributes nothing.
Ask that one person out on a date, even if you feel so silly doing it and they eventually say no.
Apply for one job, even if you think you’ll get laughed out the door.
Visit one new country, even if it is scary.
Whatever that dream is, just focus on the first step. Concentrate just on one.
They went from zero to one.
So now it’s your turn.
And who knows, perhaps running one marathon may even be your goal. And if it is, then I hope that I get to see it, and in that moment know that I will raise a glass and cheers the moment you went from zero to one.
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