It’s pretty much the function of the mind to make distinctions and judgements. We are mobile organisms and this sequential thought and decision making process is to navigate our situation. Plants don’t have a sequential thought process, because they don’t have to move and decide. We are constantly taking in enormous amounts of information/noise and deciding what is important, which way to go, what pace to set, what the next move will be, good/bad, up/down, right/left, inside/outside, etc.

Thought is that cycle, balance and tension of reductionism and contextualization. Nodes and networks.

What is important about your example is that it is a marathon, a competition. It does come down to the wire. Which is a very useful goal, for keeping focus, but the downside is that it is still a competition. You are comparing yourself to others, for better or worse. If you don’t want to take the chance, use some other metric, or keep it in context that people have been running marathons for thousands of years.

Personally I grew up as 5th of 6 kids, in a horse racing family. I know a fair amount about losing competitions and it has been very educational for setting my own goals, learning to appreciate the journey, going off the beaten path, finding ways out of the box, appreciating different details of the same scenes, picking my fights, etc.

If I’d been taken more seriously from the beginning, I’d probably be more opinionated, on less information. Certain politicians come to mind, on both sides of the debates.

It’s all educational, because the moment you stop learning is the moment you start dying. When the shell gets too hard, it has to crack open for life to continue to grow.

The price we pay to feel, is that alot of it is pain. It’s educational.