Post-labor day resolutions

I often approach the year in seasons and internally think about things I want to get better at or improve in. There is the winter-gray season of January through Spring Break. Then there is the sprint of Spring Break to the end of the school year. Then summer chaos. And the fall season of labor day to new year (hardly counting thanksgiving to christmas to accomplish anything). Anyways, that said, I started Body for Life again today and will continue it for at least the next 12 weeks. That will take me to the Thanksgiving Day 10k.

With my injury last year, I got thrown way off schedule. To be transparent, over the past 10 years I have struggled with carrying too much weight. In 2005, I lost 45 lbs. on Body for Life and felt great. Over the past year, particularly post-injury, I have put all of it back on. So now its time to get back to work and think, eat, play and be healthy again. There is an athlete still in me somewhere that longs to come out again, the pressures and schedules of life keep pushing him back down. I love competing and have no real opportunity to do that presently, so I train to run races to compete against myself.

Before my injury, I was running 10 miles regularly. I just got back from the most struggling, pathetic 2 miles ever. I have no where to go but up. I believe that the physical and the spiritual are intertwined and that as I focus on getting one healthy, the other is right there for the ride. For me, running is often a spiritual experience, an act of discipline. I train my body so that I may be available to the impulses of God. Running gets me in touch with my most primal needs and can bring alive passions deep within. The grind of a day at work is certainly not going to do that.

I want to get healthy. Eat right, run, stretch, sleep properly, read more, listen more. Those are my resolutions this season.

Stop and notice the Kingdom around you,