Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection

Found especially at the high school and college levels, the sport of cross-country running is practiced by athletes around the globe. Characterized by rigorous training, this sport is accompanied by challenges that test the perseverance and mental toughness of a runner. This thesis aims to answer the question, how is happiness achieved in running? Approaching this question from a phenomenological perspective, this project utilizes interviews that inquire into the lived experience of cross-country athletes to better understand how these athletes obtain fulfillment in running. Two groups of cross-country runners were interviewed for this thesis. The first group consisted of three male and four female current collegiate runners, who, at the time of being interviewed, actively ran for a college cross-country team. The second group consisted of four male and four female former cross-country runners, who previously ran for a structured high school team and still consider themselves to be consistent runners. This second group of runners run primarily on their own and have spent their time after their high school cross-country season navigating running in the absence of a team. Upon analyzing the answers to the provided open-ended questions, nine themes were discovered that give insight into how happiness is achieved in this sport: 1) One of the biggest motivators for running is self-improvement, 2) Running is a significant stress reliever and way to obtain a sense of freedom, 3) A team is a significant contributor to a cross-country runner’s happiness, 4) There is much pride and joy to be found in suffering, especially when that suffering is experienced with others in pursuit of collective betterment, 5) Former cross-country runners often undergo a significant shift in purpose within running after leaving their high school team, forcing them to find new ways to identify with running and achieve fulfillment, 6) While some collegiate runners experience increased running satisfaction in college, others are burdened by the heightened expectations of this higher level of competition, 7) The ways in which success is measured has a significant impact on a cross-country runner’s happiness, 8) A deeply rooted running identity can produce much happiness; however, the ways in which that identity expresses itself may negatively affect the runner, and 9) Cross-country runners reported wishing they took better care of their bodies. These themes highlight the importance of prioritizing one’s mental and physical well-being and adopting a more multifaceted approach to success that prevents an overemphasis of objective running improvement.

Individual happiness is not always correlated with societal happiness. Intrinsic happiness usually stems from sources such as authenticity, self-fulfillment, and community involvement. In contrast, extrinsic happiness comes from career success, wealth status, and popularity. The difference in these sources of happiness can create an unrealistic search for happiness in society. Individuals are chasing happiness in ways that are not obtainable or fulfilling for their individual needs. Because of this, there is an excessive amount of materialism and consumerism in society as an attempt to find or replace intrinsic happiness. Thus, I propose that if humans could learn to gather happiness intrinsically, the outcome may be a society that balances maintainable happiness and a more sustainable way of living. This hypothesis is tested by interviewing four individuals about what makes them intrinsically happy versus what they believe society says happiness comes from. Open-ended semi-structured interview questions were created by drawing on happiness literature and personal experience. Participants discussed how a focus on intrinsic happiness could affect society as a whole. The results indicate that humans naturally lean toward human connection and community involvement. Both are values with inherently positive sustainability implications and correspond to a sustainable way of life. The challenge, however, is the societal values placed on extrinsic aspects of happiness and the push away from sustainability.