Q: Two of my neighbors are triathletes. Is this a Boulder thing? I might want to train because I’m going through something, but it seems like their entire lives. Is that healthy?
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This one’s complicated. Endurance sports can be alchemical, transforming time, presence and physical effort into something magical. When your own heartbeat is all you hear, it’s transcendent.
Athletics can be a lifeline that directs us when we’re lost, converting emotional pain into a physical purpose. This can help us regulate mood through motion, metabolize grief and reclaim agency after trauma. Even without grief or loss, athletic endeavors are a way to move our energy or find a concrete achievable focus to feel powerful or limitless, to prove we can achieve something seemingly impossible with persistence.
We can run through something. But we can also run from it.
You’re wise to be cautious: The key isn’t whether it’s healthy, but what your relationship is with it. When you can’t make family dinner because you must hit those extra miles, body crying for rest, please stop. It’s no longer liberating if it’s rigid, obsessive or disconnecting.
When structure feels like salvation
Ultramarathons, triathlons and long-distance cycling often draw people during periods of loss or transition. We crave clarity and control when our lives are unwieldy. These activities offer forward motion when everything feels stuck.
It’s not just metaphorical. Endurance sports physically mimic emotional suffering: discomfort, struggle, depletion, repair. But unlike emotional pain, we choose this suffering. That matters. Voluntary pain can feel like power, especially if your past includes helplessness. Unlike loneliness, there’s a beginning, middle and end — a way to measure progress and provide a sense of triumph.
You get to take what you need: replace unhealthy habits, substitute group training for isolation, get outdoors away from an inward loop of toxic rumination, attune to your body and listen for inner guidance, or learn to follow the direction of a routine. You get to feel better, feel something, or feel less. Physical sensations crowd out mental noise. And physical persistence can increase hope and perseverance in other areas of life. But beware false idols. This is not your salvation.
The neurochemistry of motion
Extended exertion floods your system with dopamine, serotonin and endorphins. These chemicals are depleted in grief, depression or early recovery from addiction. This chemical cocktail offers immediate and profound relief. For some, it’s the first time they’ve felt OK in their bodies.
But when movement becomes the only way to regulate mood or cope with life, it stops being healing. It gets a bit bossy.
A healthy relationship with endurance sports looks like:
· Taking rest days and allowing yourself to tune into emotions and sensations
· Listening to body over metrics to guide training; checking in, not out
· Using movement as one tool among many for emotional process and regulation
· Staying available to other people and commitments, celebrating life’s diversity
· Holding training goals loosely, with room for daily body shifts and life’s unpredictability
· Working with coaches/therapists who understand the psychology of sport
Addictive patterns include:
· Doing more than intended; unsuccessful efforts to moderate (loss of control)
· Craving or needing it to feel normal (dependence)
· Continuing despite harm (denial)
· Neglecting obligations or relationships, overtaking bandwidth (salience/dominance)
· Tolerance and withdrawal (biochemical)
· Engaging to escape other hard things (avoidance)
· Inordinate time spent planning for/pursuing/engaging in/recovering (preoccupation)
When coping becomes compulsion
If recreational movement is no longer a choice but a demand, sound the alarm.
Be on alert if you are a perfectionist, bounce between extremes or are highly competitive. As you continue in your journey, ask if you enjoy what you’re doing or simply feel compelled. Ask yourself why the intensity of endurance sports interests you. There are good reasons to commit to movement — and bad ones.
Embodiment or denial?
Exercise facilitates embodiment: feeling your feet greet the earth, cultivating gratitude for these fleshy bits that do cool things. But training can mask body image issues, disordered eating or exercise bulimia (needing to counter calories consumed by expending equal or greater calories through movement). If you’re constantly checking the numbers, the mirror, your body composition, or judging yourself for missed/imperfect workouts, the pursuit of health may be hiding a deeper problem. You may need gentle care more than pushing and striving.
The demagogy of discipline
Cultural narratives glamorize “no excuses” as grit. Nike told us to. But overtraining stalls progress, compromises immunity, increases injury and depletes resilience. It diverts attention from diverse and important life experiences. Pain isn’t virtue. Self-punishment in this form is just a culturally condoned masochism.
When the goalpost keeps moving, if no PR (personal record) feels like enough, you might not be chasing health; you might be chasing worth. And “doing” will never amount to enough for you to have peace with your “being.”
Purpose and people
Endurance sports become part of who we are and enhance belonging. We work hard because we value meaningful effort. We integrate our goals into our self-concepts: We are marathoners. And we accomplish it together. It’s a beautiful irony that training for competition is often collaborative. But if performance becomes our only source of self-esteem and social contact, then how do we survive injury, plateau or aging?
While training together can be a form of connection, it can also isolate us from other networks. An obsessive mind will stack on solitary training. If it’s the priority, you become self-absorbed. If it’s a priority, you can be a better friend and partner because it enhances wellbeing. Just make sure you’re still in charge of the relationship and the sport isn’t running you. Because once you start going it alone, the practice becomes a prison.
Consistent adjustment
Change it up to maintain flexibility, spontaneity and freedom. Listen to your body and shift from external goals to internal cues. You don’t have to quit or go all in. Read your rhythm: grit and grace must alternate.
Not all pain can or should be processed through motion. Some of it needs stillness. Healing often happens by feeling what we’re avoiding, not by outrunning it.
Meditative and meaningful
When pursued with mindfulness, endurance sports can be sacred. They can be a spiritual practice, a way to process deep feeling, connect and reclaim power. They can build resilience, self-reliance and even nervous system regulation.
Bilateral movement (like walking or cycling) can support emotional processing. But the alchemy only works when you’re present.
Final thoughts
Would you rather learn to be with or master yourself? Intention counts. Your why matters.
Your neighbors may be dedicated and joyful in their sport. Or they may be trapped in an unrelenting achievement loop. You can’t know from the outside. But you can experiment and play at your own pace.
Endurance sports are liberating when pursued in partnership with your body, not in opposition to it. Healing begins when effort is balanced by rest. And sometimes, your mental health hits its stride when your breath stops racing and starts leading.
Write in with your questions: bit.ly/AskaTherapistBW. And check Find Your Center Therapy’s blog for a deeper dive: findyourcentertherapy.com/blog.
This column provides general mental health insights. This advice is for informational/entertainment purposes only and does not constitute professional, personalized medical, psychological or therapeutic treatment. While we strive for accuracy and inclusion, our feedback may not account for all competing theories and research in the field.