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What the author does not seem to understand is that some people actually enjoy doing hard things. 35,755 people signed up for the Boston Marathon yesterday, and
by diego 12y ago
What the author does not seem to understand is that some people actually enjoy doing hard things. 35,755 people signed up for the Boston Marathon yesterday, and paid for it. Why pay to run 26 miles when you could be having a lazy Sunday breakfast instead?
I practice a form of rock climbing called bouldering. It's about walking up to a big boulder and climbing it along the hardest possible line you can. Hikers sometimes point out that "you could have just walked up on the other side."
Yes, doing a startup is hard. It can also be fun (probably type II or type III fun if you ask me). A climber named Kevin Jorgeson explained it quite well during a talk he gave at Google:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vsl4evw0a7Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vsl4evw0a7Q
- scrabble 12y agoWhy pay to run 26 miles when you can run 26 miles for free? I think it's generally for the prestige of being able to say, "I ran the Boston Marathon."
- baddox 12y agoI would guess that's it's not primarily about prestige, except perhaps for the top level competitors. A well-known marathon gives a concrete deadline for people to train toward. The fact that thousands of people are running at the same time gives a feeling of solidarity.
- Someone 12y agoThose other runners also show most of the competitors that there are others who aren't (much) faster or (much) more athletic that can complete a marathon, and the spectators may also provide inspiration, if only because one may feel a loser when giving up in front of a crowd, if not entirely exhausted.
- pyrrhotech 12y agoWhy go to the bar and pay $6 for a beer that costs 75 cents at the grocery store? Same concept I think