warning - this is timm talking to the camera like its linkedin out here, but my purpose is to help yall with the career stuff first and foremost, so here goes because sometimes that specific guidance you crave at work might actually be a trap, and you may need a lot of grey to thrive even if it feels wildly uncomfortable at first PS - kelly’s best time was a 3:14 hence me leaning on her for the plan considering it was her 21st marathon and my 3rd, never going faster than 4:26

I was genuinely concerned that I was going to burn out, so I asked a really specific question at about mile 5 or 6. Is the pace that we are at something that I can sustain for the next 20-ish miles? And I didn't get the answer that I wanted, but I got the answer that I needed. Running with my wife, our only goal was to finish at the same time. I thought we were going way too fast for the first 5 or 6 miles, and wanted her badly to say, here's the game plan. But she didn't. She basically said, you tell me. You've already done the work, you've already done the training, this is the pace that you have run at. Not for this distance. But you've got to tell me, and you tell me when you want to slow down. At first, that landed like a ton of bricks with me mentally, but it was exactly what I needed to hear. And I'm telling you this story because how many times in our career do we want our boss or coworker to say specifically, here's exactly how it's going to go. This is what we're going to do. Which is great, but your best outcome might be dependent on your ability to understand that when you're given less rigor, or if it feels unwieldy, and you have more in control than you might be comfortable with, that that's okay, and that's probably where you're actually going to find your greatest, not only opportunity, but your greatest success. I don't think that we run a 3.50 yesterday, which was 36 minutes faster than I had done the previous year. That's nuts. That's a big chunk of time. I don't think that we'd do that if I got the answer that I wanted. I would have either been too nervous that it was too fast and too aggressive, or would have been too conservative, but not have gotten to where we got to. So it's okay if you don't have the specifics that you feel like you really, really want right now. If you have that opportunity to just go and run, go and run. It's okay when you don't have all the answers, and it might actually lead to an outcome that greatly exceeds your expectations.