Is my life a sprint?

I was a self-made sprinter. I could run miles and miles and not be out of breath. But I was  not running anywhere, neither was I chasing after anything; rather, I was running away from things, people, feelings, associations, even myself. I had this belief that I was nobody-even lesser than ordinary and my greatest fear was that people will discover this in me and recoil. The idea of running was not exactly a deliberate action on my part. I probably had reached a point in my life where I thought my association with people was tilting toward the inconsequential and that my efforts will always be met by a disapproving expression from both the people I look up to and those that fall into the group of those that, I presume, do not have an inkling as to whether I exist or not.

Of course, this only goes to prove that for a long time, I had believed that my relevance in life is only confirmed when people throw approving glances at me every once in a while- if not for my mental ingenuity but for my well-groomed appearance. Really, who says my worth is proven only by what people think of me. When is it that a person needs another’s approval, commendation or compliment to be certain that he is relevant to himself and to those he is responsible to? Nonetheless, I still had doubts in my life about who I was and where I was headed. The mere thought of the unknown sent me into a bout of self deprecation and depression, so the running gathered momentum. I began running from contacts, from the minuscle show of attention and affection, from every occasion where I had to show a sense of affection and commitment to the next person to me...