Those of you who know me well, know that I'm extremely undisciplined and OCD at the same time. Not a good combination for mental and physical health. I have two speeds, "I'll get to it when I get to it" and "Oh, NO, they'll be here in 10 minutes I have to wash the windows!" I've figured out if I could just find that happy medium between the two speeds, my life would be much less hectic. How do you do that? By adding one discipline at a time until it's a habit and building on those disciplines until you have a good routine. Well, that's what I've been told. I'll let you know how all that goes when I reach that level of enlightenment. In the mean time, I'm making an attempt to apply the oxygen mask principle in my life and acting on a strong new conviction for maintaining my physical health.
I'm quite ashamed lately at just how out of shape I let myself get. Now, you wouldn't have really known I was unhealthy from the outside. I'm one of those naturally skinny people that other people like to hate. It's genetic. My mom was always thin. Her sister was always thin. My brothers are skinny. Most of my cousins on my mom's side are super skinny. My doctor husband swears I have some kind of thyroid problem, but has yet to find any evidence of that besides a few incidental symptoms and the fact that I can pretty much eat whatever I want and not be as big as a house. Here's the thing though. You don't have to look fat to be UNhealthy, and you don't have to look skinny to BE healthy. It's not about the outside. It's about the inside. Sound familiar? Jesus had something to say about the power of the mind and the inner man. In God's eyes, lust is equal with adultery, rage is equal with murder, etc. He chastised the religious elite of his day for washing the outside of the cup and ignoring the filth on the inside. I've been quite surprised at the parallels between physical fitness and spiritual fitness lately. More on that in a bit.
I had deteriorated into weak and helpless or, as I like to call it, skinny fat. You hear people say all the time that you never know how valuable your health is until you lose it. Well, I want to cherish that gift. I want to be real physically and spiritually. I want to know that I will be around in my best condition to care for my children into their adulthood, specifically Jackson, should that take more than the usual 18 years. I don't want to just LOOK healthy because I'm skinny. I want to BE healthy, inside and out. So, putting on my oxygen mask and taking care of my own physical well being, I started making some changes.
My husband bought me a treadmill (I would say he bought US a treadmill, but he's only used it twice), and I got started. I cut out ALL sugar from my diet (except for vitamin water and protein bars when I ran), and began a walk-a-little, run-a-little beginner's program. It was awesome! I felt so productive and cool, and I was doing really well until I got to the part where the running time started exceeding the walking time. That's when the trouble started. My shins started to hurt. I pushed through and kept up with the program. Three times a week, 30 minutes a session. Then the pain got so bad I could hardly walk after. My husband said it was probably just the muscles rather than shin splints or anything serious. They were just not used to all the activity. I was a little offended at the idea, but I used it as an excuse to buy new shoes and pushed through (new shoes make everything better). He was right. My legs were just that weak. Then my knees started hurting the same kind of way, nearly unbearable, even on my off days. At this point, my mental fortitude started to crumble. "Maybe I'm just not cut out for this. Maybe I should find something else to do, something easier." Somehow I kept pushing through. I just wasn't ready to give up yet. I wasn't ready to say I had failed, AGAIN, at yet another thing. I got up to 2 miles a session only walking to warm up and cool down (bringing the total mileage to 3 miles a session). Then I got bored. What am I supposed to do for 30 minutes three times a week while my body is screaming at me to stop this craziness and go have some pie? I figured out I could read while I ran, awesome! Then I decided I would have to buy all large print books for that because it was just too hard to read while I was bouncing up and down. Maybe my eye sight is failing in my old age. Then I figured out how to run while surfing pinterest or watching tv. That helped for a little while, but I just couldn't get used to the new format. Television and internet are activities best enjoyed while sitting on the couch or comfy desk chair, preferably eating a yummy snack. Of course I tried music, audio books and sermons, but I just couldn't figure out how to keep my mind focused while my body did what I told it to do. Running outside hasn't worked out since the only times I can really do that is before my husband leaves for work or later when everyone is settled at night, and my paranoid husband thinks someone is going to kidnap me if I do that. So, the treadmill is it for me.
I thought this was supposed to be fun. People run for fun, right? For that runners high? Things are harder when you can't agree with yourself. I started slowing down. Struggling with every session. I had been doing yoga longer than I had been running, and I started to think maybe that was more my speed. I had added strength training to my routine, and was enjoying the fruits of that labor. (My arms look awesome!) I tried jumping rope. Oh my! That's not a good idea for a woman who has had three kids and is extremely out of shape. I will spare you the details, but I will say my twelve year old self would have been rolling on the ground busting a gut laughing at my 29+ year old self attempting that routine. I kind of wish I had a camera rolling. I could have won some kind of reality show prize, seriously! Somehow, I kept running, and somewhere in the middle of all this, my knees stopped hurting. Yay! I then started struggling with my left hip, complications from an injury during my first pregnancy. Are you kidding me? Really? Is the pain just going to creep up my body one joint group at a time? What is going on?
My new diet wasn't cutting it, either. I NEEDED sugar! I had no energy, and was really struggling by the end of the day. Severe fatigue and headache by about 6pm. If sugar is a no-no, then what am I supposed to eat to reach the caloric intake I need to maintain my weight while increasing my activity? I give up. Give me CANDY! No, wait. Maybe I can balance this out. So, we're back to my original thought process in figuring out Jackson's diet. Sugar is NOT the enemy, especially with moderation and proper portioning. No junk does not necessarily mean no sugar. Then I pulled a muscle, not while I was running actually. That was all I needed to just completely melt down. I'm trying SO hard, and I'm eating right while my husband enjoys his ice cream and junk food and has somehow lost 12 pounds just mowing the grass and not eating fast food. It's not fair. Now what am I supposed to do?
This is when God hit me with more parallels between the physical and spiritual realness I was after.
1. Making the inside of my body match the outside is going to take time, and it's going to hurt, apparently a LOT.
Parallel: Making the life I'm living a reflection of my heart's condition rather than the screen I use to keep everyone from seeing the real condition of my heart is going to take time, and it's going to hurt, probably a LOT more than all this healthy stuff is going to hurt my body.
2. I'm not an athletic person. I've never been an athletic person. My body is going to go through a period of shock as I try to add these new activities in my life, especially having waited SO late in my life to begin this new lifestyle.
Parallel: I'm not a disciplined person. I've never been a disciplined person. My heart is going to go through a period of shock as I try to add new spiritual disciplines in my life, especially having waited SO long to begin this new lifestyle.
That doesn't mean it isn't worth it.
Tomorrow I plan to run again for the first time in nearly four weeks. Hopefully, this muscle has healed and I can get back into my original routine, and hopefully, I can use my future running experiences to fuel more spiritual discovery.
One of my favorite quotes:
"You do not have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body." - C.S. Lewis
I want to push my body to it's limits. I want to experience how health feels when you earn it. I want to push my spirit to it's limits as well. I want to remove the weights and hindrances that hold me back from experiencing abundant life, the kind earned for me on Calvary. I can't help but feel like they're intertwined right now, my physical health and my spiritual health. So, I feel like I'm running for my life. It would be nice if I could figure out a way to make running spiritual WHILE I'm doing it, but so far the only prayers I can get out sound like "Oh, God, it hurts. Help me." Things like that. We'll see. The thing I need to push for right now is perseverance, something I've lacked my whole life. Gotta stick it out, and see where I am when this race is over.
Note: I wrote this post last night, but somehow it didn't post before I signed out. So, I'll just go ahead and tell you that my run this morning was awesome! It did start hurting again, the pulled muscle. More of a tightness than a pain. So, I quit at a mile and a half, but it felt SO good! That plus my strength training, and I'm feeling like I can conquer the world again. To quote a little fish I have always felt a strong connection with, "just keep swimming, just keep swimming." Or, in my case, just keep running. The race isn't over until you meet your Savior face to face; so, just keep going.
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