When I started to work toward my doctor degree 5 years ago, I made the painful decision to leave my first program after spending my first year battling depression, anxiety, and disordered eating. I couldn’t help but see myself as a ______ who was almost unable to ______ the challenges of graduate school.

That situation started to ______ when one of my classmates invited me to run a half-marathon. I had ______ run a race that long, but I decided to give it a ______ . Strangely enough, I was addicted to it. Less than a year later, I was racing ultra-distance trail events of up to 50 miles, where many people dropped out on the way. By joining in such a sport where failures are more ______ than successes, I had a new ______ with failure. When an injury ______ me to walk at the end of a recent 50-mile race, my ______ miles went along with my biggest smiles.

Earlier in my studies, when experiments failed, I would be ______ to consider the failure as an ______ to try something new. But now I have taken failures as necessary to achieve ______ and find meaning. In ultra-running, a race is “life in a day”, because an endurance adventure brings all the highs and lows. Having this way of thinking has made a ______ in my life.

Being successful does not mean ______ recognition, awards, or major publications. But it just means having the ______ to start an uncertain adventure and journey into the vast unknown.