The Direction You're Going

Mile 9 of the Brooklyn Half. The heat had been climbing since the gun, and by that point in the course, it was on top of me. For my runners, you know that kind of heat that stops being weather and becomes a physical presence sitting on your chest, that was it. I’d been rolling. Sub-race-pace, in the zone, head clear, nothing but the next mile marker. And then my body said no.

I slowed down. Not to a walk, but running much slower than before. And for the first time in nine miles, I looked around.

The ground was covered in wrappers.

I mean covered. Gel packets, foil torn open and thrown, GU wrappers in three colors, Clif Shot bags. Half of them were within a few feet of a trash bin. The other half not. I know the ground well because I stare at it often. I’ve been a runner long enough that when I train, when I race, I’m always half-watching the pavement for what might trip me. But usually, I’m moving. Usually, the ground blurs. That day, I could see it.

I also had a gel packet in my hand, and it was time to take one.

Now, I used to toss them. Everyone does. There’s a stretch after every aid station where the ground looks like a parade route the morning after. You’re running, you’re focused, you tell yourself someone will sweep it up later. And it’s one wrapper. What’s one wrapper?

That day, I tucked it into my hydration vest. Same place I put it on training runs, when nobody’s handing out cups, and nobody’s cleaning up after me. There is a cleanup crew on race day. I know that. But they’re not responsible for my mess. Nobody saw me put it away. Nobody would have known if I hadn’t. It doesn’t matter, and it does.

• • •

Here’s the other thing runners see. I run through intersections a lot. Stop signs, red lights, and the crosswalks where drivers are supposed to yield or really STOP. And I have noticed — with the kind of clarity that comes from almost being hit numerous times — that most drivers making a right turn do not look right.

They look left. They check for oncoming traffic. They wait for their gap. And then they turn, never once glancing in the direction they are about to go.

I’ve been apologized to more times than I can count. So sorry, didn’t see you. And I believe the sorry. What I don’t always believe is the concern. There’s a version of “I didn’t see you” that means I’ll do better, and a version that means, “What do you want me to say?” and we runners can tell the difference.

But the thing that’s stuck with me isn’t the near misses. It’s the metaphor. Nobody looks in the direction they’re trying to go.

• • •

I know that intersection from both sides.

I know it as the runner. The rooms I couldn’t get into. The doors that were technically open but not really. The people who apologized profusely for not seeing me, and I could tell, from the apology, that they weren’t going to look next time either. That’s what taught me to hold doors fully open when it was my turn. Not cracked, not “reach out if you need anything,” but open. Iron sharpens iron. When I can go, so can you. When I can get connected, so can you. That part I learned from being overlooked.

But the harder part I’ve had to learn is that being the runner nobody saw doesn’t automatically make me a driver who looks.

• • •

It got me thinking about the intersections I’ve missed as a founder, which weren’t the ones with obvious danger. They were the ones where I kept driving straight because straight felt like commitment. Straight felt like belief. Straight felt like the founder thing to do.

I kept paying for the tool we’d outgrown because we’d already integrated it. I kept a hire on longer than I should have because letting go felt like admitting I’d been wrong to bring them on. I said yes to the panel, the coffee, the “quick call,” because saying no felt like closing a door I might need later, or disappointing someone who’d remember.

None of that was courage. All of it was avoidance dressed up as momentum. I wasn’t looking left at real danger, and I wasn’t looking right at the real direction. I was looking at what people would think (the board, the team, the person, the organizer, and sometimes even my critical internal voice) and calling that leadership.

Looking right, as a founder, is admitting that the company you need to build is not the same as the company you started building. That’s the runway math. That’s the person who won’t grow into the role. That’s the event that won’t change your business. Looking right means turning your head toward the version of the company that survives. And then driving toward it.

I’ve missed those turns and sometimes more than once. And every time, the crash was quieter than a real one. A slow bleed of runway, a team member who should have been freed up months earlier, a Tuesday afternoon I’ll never get back. But the drivers who nearly hit me on my runs? They didn’t feel the near-miss either. That’s the point. You don’t feel the intersection you didn’t look at. You just wonder later why you ended up where you did.

• • •

Michael Jackson was right. If you want to make the world a better place, look at yourself and make a change. (Yes, I loved the new Michael movie) But I don’t think he was talking about grand gestures. I think he was talking about the wrapper in your hand. The right turn you’re about to make. The version of the company that’s over your shoulder, waiting for you to look at it.

Tiny consequences. Unwitnessed choices. The kind of small that adds up to who you are, as a runner, as a driver, as a founder, as a person moving through the world.

I put my wrapper in my vest. I look right at every intersection now. I hold the door open ALL the way. And I’m learning — still learning — to turn my head toward the direction I’m going, even when straight feels safer.

That’s the change. That’s the mirror.

Thanks for reading.

Disrupting For Good.

Dana L. Wilson

BKA Dana Disrupts

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