Back on My Feet: Running Toward Transformation

For over three decades, Hope For New York has been connecting kind and compassionate New Yorkers with nonprofits and churches to bring tangible hope to communities that need it most. Among our 80+ nonprofit partners is Back on My Feet, a national organization that supports neighbors facing homelessness and addiction through the power of running together. A faithful volunteer shares her experience running with Back on My Feet.

It doesn't sound crazy, in the middle of an NYC summer, to join a running group that meets at 5:30 am. In fact, that's an ideal time to run–the sun is just coming up, and the blistering heat/humidity combo is not quite set in. That's what I told myself when I saw the listing on HFNY's volunteer opportunities page for a Morning Circle Up volunteer with Back on My Feet (BOMF). 

After a few weeks of fruitless searching for a way to volunteer in my neighborhood, I had turned to HFNY's board for any opportunity located in Brooklyn. BOMF empowers individuals experiencing addiction and homelessness to build community through running or walking together three times a week. If I couldn't do something for my literal neighbors, at least I could serve a community that was already important to me. After a long pep talk about how I could commit to one early morning a week, I signed up—and received an email that the Circle Up location was a 5-minute walk from home! 

A year and a half in, I have learned a few things worth sharing. First, if 5:30 am feels early in the summer, it does not get better in January when it's 18° and dark outside. Second, early mornings are a wonderful equalizer–everyone is similarly disheveled and ready to start moving so they can finish in time for a morning coffee. Third, sharing activities and goals across participants removes the apparent distinctions between volunteers and members.

This last one requires a little bit of explanation, but it is the core of why I love BOMF. A few weeks ago, we gathered in Central Park for our annual run to the Rockefeller Christmas tree. Every Circle Up group in NYC was represented by a mix of volunteers and members—it’s one of the few times a year we all see one another. Amidst all of the new faces, it was impossible to tell the participants apart. Everyone shared with equal vulnerability something they were grateful for, then we came together to say the same Serenity Prayer and run the same route. 

This is the unique joy of BOMF. By running and walking together, there is no sense that one group is serving and the other group is being served. Some members are better runners than volunteers, some volunteers are happier to be awake in the morning than others, and so on. We highlight our humanness as we bear the image of God, and we equally need one another to grow and become transformed.

Carys Walter is the Operations and Executive Coordinator at Avail NYC.

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