Ordinary World

Ten years on from their multi-platinum album Rio, the Duranie’s revived their career with the self-titled album ‘Duran Duran’ also known as the Wedding Album. ‘Ordinary World’ was the stand-out track for me and lyrically underlines my thoughts about creating a new life with fresh limitations without crying about what happened yesterday. 

Trying to find my ‘Ordinary World’ has taken every last drop of my energy. It’s challenged my inner soul and taught me how to survive when the chips have been down. Being a GBS survivor isn’t ordinary. It teaches you to accept where you find yourself and to make of it what you can, with what you’ve got. Not an easy feat, especially when you find yourself lost when even being ‘Ordinary’ will do.

 

Covid-19 has changed the world. Having had my own private five-month-long lockdown with GBS, the national lockdown wasn’t too hard to handle. Since GBS, I’ve run 150 marathons and I’ve enjoyed every single one of them. I realise I’m very lucky even to have run just one. My mind’s in the right place. You see, in recovery you need a goal, something to focus on. The bigger the better. That gives one purpose. So, in 2016 although I was wheelchair-bound, the concept of another Marathon des Sables was all I needed to get me out of bed each day. It’s what I needed to get me through the darkness. 

 

Every day I thought about my massive goal. However weak and cheesed-off I felt, I thought by April 2017 I had a chance of being fit enough to once again take on the desert. I mean what could go wrong and I had thirteen years’ of experience to lean on. Actually, looking back when I did take part, I really did do it on very shaky legs. And I was especially unsafe on the rocky downhills, although I also wasn’t too brilliant going uphill either, if I’m being honest! 

   

Anyway, I went, survived and conquered my demons, nevertheless. I will admit that I gave it everything I had and more. I went there much physically weaker than I had been previously. And instead of surrounding myself in the eight-person tent with folk I could help, I looked for folk that could support me instead as I needed some emotional support.

 

The race was a moving experience for me, especially as I summited Jebel Oftal. It’s one of the highlights of the race and is the same height as Mount Snowdon in Wales. And I always say to my clients who I train for the race, ‘When you get to the top, stop and look back, and look at the vast wilderness you’ve covered’. Being so high up, you can see for miles as other people approach the Jebel, it’s like peering at a trail of ants from afar. Staring at the panorama, I felt my bottom lip quiver as I never actually thought I’d see that place again. A life-moment. A life-changing moment. A moment when I knew I was still far from ordinary.

 

The question is, if your life’s ordinary, how are you going to spice it up? Make it exciting. Give it purpose. Silence the white noise. Eject the people that are cramping your style and stop wasting time on the daily nonsense of addiction?

 

It’s time my friends… and it’s not as hard as you think.

1,126 Marathons - 261 Ultras - 15 Marathon des Sables - 9 Guinness World Records