INCREASINGLY, PHYSICAL, mental, and spiritual challenges are vanishing. Modern society has propagated the notion that the American Constitution somewhere guarantees happiness, safety, and complete medical coverage, instead of merely proclaiming the equal right to pursue these conditions.

Parents want education for their children but don’t want it to be challenging or painful. Middle-aged folks want good health and fitness but don’t want to work for it. The overweight seek a svelte body by ingesting diet pills. The young demand respect merely because they exist. The old demand respect because they have existed. The voters want honest politicians until one of them tells the truth.

Against the backdrop of millions of timorous souls hoping for that guaranteed safety, one-tenth of one percent each year go against the grain and embark on a perilous journey covering 26.2 miles on their own two feet—a journey in which the only guarantee is that there are no guarantees.

Some new marathoners attempt to make the journey as painless as possible. Other, more grizzled, marathoners continue to experiment with their training and racing, hoping against hope for that one “perfect” marathon. The pursuit of perfection, by definition, is fraught with frustration, for it is never really reached. Each approach pushes the perfection beyond the next hill. Yet the marathon provides an arena in which intelligence, determination, and hard work can combine to approach perfection, at least against the constraints with which each of us is born. The marathon provides an opportunity for us to compete against our own limitations.

Jonathan Beverly, who’s been our European correspondent this past year, posed to us the concept of the marathon as a test in which each of us can pursue our own unique perfection. We thought it would be interesting to pose the challenge to an entire spectrum of marathoners to share how they have used the marathon as an opportunity to go for the best they are capable of achieving. Jon broke the reasons for the pursuit into four areas:

A great equalizer. More than any other event, the marathon rewards persistence, planning, and experience. It is impossible to cram for a marathon, to rely solely on natural ability, or to buy success. This area appeals to those of us who may not have had the natural athletic ability to enjoy success in other sports but have found in the marathon a thinking person’s sport.

A test of character. George Sheehan called the marathon a “fitting stage for heroism.” From the initial decision to train for and race the marathon to the final two-tenths of a mile, the marathon provides occasion to prove our integrity and courage, rare in this comfortable, compromised age.

A means of escape. Sherlock Holmes once commented, “My life is spent in one long effort to escape from the commonplaces of existence.” Sherlock solved mysteries; others run marathons. Each marathon presents an infinitely expandable challenge, with a new and unique set of variables to consider and overcome, requiring total involvement of the mind and body.

A grand inspiration. The scale of the marathon is so large, it provides purpose and meaning to daily activities. The experience is so intense and complete, it inspires us to rise above the status quo. Like Machiavelli’s “Prince,” marathoners are in a constant state of preparation for battle, each day providing another opportunity to better prepare and move one step closer to the goal.

Herein we’ve enlisted a range of marathoners, from an Olympic marathoner to a marathoner who has broken 4:00, to share their motivations, agonies, challenges, inspirations—and their souls—as they strive for a perfection impossible to achieve but only too possible and enticing to imagine.