The One Where I Give Up. (sorta)

 Yes. Yes, I am. My closest friends are probably sick and tired of hearing me whine about it, too. And I can't say as I blame them. I feel like it's all I ever talk about, yet I also feel like it's something I don't talk about enough.  What I do know for sure is that I've been looking for affirmation and inspiration in the wrong places.  I've started reading Lysa TerKeurst's "The Best Yes". I feel like she wrote this book for me.  While I've only read through Chapter 6, I have already had some profound "aha" moments.

Hi, my name is Allison and I'm a people pleaser. I've known that for a long time.  I haven't always been this way. I can tell you the exact moment in my life that I became this weeping, cowering willow but that's another blog entirely. In the book, Lysa describes this as "the disease to please", and it truly is. Thankfully, there's a cure. It's all Him. It's ALWAYS been Him.

There are so many things in my life that I try to control. That I try to accomplish on my own. When am I going to learn that I cannot physically, spiritually, or emotionally do it all? I'm not that awesome, but He is. Saying "yes" all the time won't make me Wonder Woman. It will make me a worn-out woman.

That's kind of where I am.  What am I giving up? The disillusion that I'm able to just keep saying
"yes" when I know that I can't, or shouldn't.  Will I stumble? Yes. Why? Because I'm a sinner and deserve the worst. To be completely honest, I don't deserve to even talk to God, but I do. The only thing that is getting me through this season of my life is prayer and lots of it.  The only way to become wise is to ask for wisdom. He will provide. He always has, and always will. My God is an awesome God.

The One where I'm Uncomfortable.

1. 

   
   

   So that's it. I'm uncomfortable. Yes, I've lost a bunch of weight and kept most of it off, but I still have a lot to go, and I find it unacceptable that I'm not done yet. Wait, I'll never be done. This is my demon, my cross to bear. Every morning that I wake up and put pants and a shirt on, I reflexively grab a cardigan or jacket to cover my arms.  I don't wear shorts. I don't wear a swimsuit in front of other people (if I can help it) and if I do, I'm convinced that they're looking at me and laughing.

   
   

   God loves me, I know that. But I'm not going to use the "God loves me no matter what I look like" as a cop out.  Yes, He loves me no matter what.  But He also expects for me to crave Him and not food, and for me to spend the time that I am emotionally eating coming to Him in prayer instead.  He has given me instructions, and I'm ignoring them. 

   
   

   Yes, I'm busy. I teach full-time, (which if you're a teacher or know one, you know it's more like full-time and a half), I take a graduate class each semester, I have a husband and two (active) kids, and I am a Director for Thirty-One Gifts.  All of which are a necessity at this stage in my life for one reason or another. I cannot "give up" any of them. Yet. With all that said, I am not putting my health high up enough on the list of priorities. My priorities are as follows: 1) God, 2) My husband, 3) My kids, and then comes everything and everyone else. As it should be. Sometimes, priorities 4-100 get jumbled around, and my health easily takes a back seat to things that it shouldn't.

   
   

   Which is why I have decided to wake up Monday-Friday at 4:30am to go for a walk.Yes, I said 4:30am. My husband looked at me the way you pretty much are right now, most likely.  I always find excuses as to why I can't go work out, and sometimes the excuses are valid. There literally is no time left in my days.  Even if I get to sit down for 30min-1hr of TV at the end of the day once the kids are in bed, chances are that I'm working on my laptop simultaneously. I have to make my health a priority, and that means making some sacrifices. In this case, sleep. Guess I need to institute my 9pm bedtime again, eh?

   
   

   I am writing this blog in no way to make you feel pity on me.  In fact, I'd rather you hold me accountable and make me feel guilty if I tell you "No, I didn't work out today."  I am a member of Weight Watchers Online, but I miss the accountability that the scale and the members bring from a meeting. I need someone to push me, to make me mad, or I tend to slack off.  I'm being totally and completely transparent here! 

   
   

   I may not have time to be "bathing suit" ready in 2 weeks when I go to the beach for a Thirty-One Leadership Retreat (yay!!) but I sure as heck will bring my water bottle, and my bathing suit.  Maybe people will laugh. But I'll know that at least I'm doing something about it. I don't want to be uncomfortable. In my life, or when I put my pants on in the morning. I've got this.

Choose Joy.

 Chew on this:

"Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer." -Romans 12:12

Why even bother worrying about everything, being anxious about tomorrow, letting it tie you up in knots? A good friend of mine posed the following question on Facebook today: "What do you do when you're anxious and need to unwind?" The responses varied of course, but one rang true. "Praise and worship. Prayer."

It seems so simple doesn't it?  That all we'd have to do to feel at peace would be to pray, to spend time with God?  Who are we without Him, really?  I say all of this to preach to myself too, friends.  Don't think by any means that I am perfect, or that I do what I say I need to do 100% of the time.  I constantly have to remind myself (and be reminded) that tomorrow will come with whatever trials and tribulations that it is supposed to contain.  I cannot do anything to change this, but what I can do is recognize that I am fully equipped to deal with it.  All of it.

What needs to be done is this:

1) Rejoice.  Be joyful. Not fake-joyful, but really JOYFUL.  What does this look like? You know what it looks like: the swell in your heart that you feel when your children run to you at the end of a long day and hug your neck, the look your husband (or wife) gives you when they truly appreciate something (or things) that you have done and no thanks is needed, hearing the rain fall on your window as you fall peacefully asleep, the rainbow you spot on your way to work just as dawn is approaching.  We have moments of joy in our day, and we must embrace them. 

2) Be patient.  This is hard for some of us.  There are those (weird and crazy) people that seem to have all the patience in the world.  When their kids run in the house after being told not to 14 times in a row, they just smile and correct their children again.  I am not one of those people.  I am the mom that locks herself in the bathroom for at least a few minutes so I can cool off and breathe deeply before embracing the madness again in the living room. What I strive to do daily is this: recognize that every moment is a gift, and should be treated as such.  Just like I can't make time slow down, I can't make it speed up either.  I may want something to happen for me or my family NOW, but if it is not God's time for that to happen NOW, then I need to accept it.  Who knows more about what I need: me or God? Exactly.

3) Be constant in prayer. Every morning before I get out of my car at work, I read my devotional and pray.  During our "moment of silence" in 1st period at school, in front of 15 students, I pray.  When the whole "trying to teach teenagers who won't listen to a thing you say because they know more than you" gets to me, I pray.  When I feel like my children are going to be the end of me, I pray.  It's truly the only thing that can calm me down in true, ugly, real moments of anxiety.  Do I still freak out, flip out, feel sorry for myself, and worry? Of course I do. I'm human, and I'm a sinner.

All we can do is do better tomorrow. Try harder. Be better versions of ourselves tomorrow than we are today. 

The One with Finding the Peace

Depart from evil, and do good; seek peace, and pursue it.
                                                     Psalms 34:14 


So there's more than once facet of my day to day life that this verse speaks to.

First and most glaringly, my battle with food.  Every single day, I need to remind myself of this. To depart from the evils that are cravings, emotional eating, and things that are just not good for me. To seek peace with the decisions to not eat this or that, and to pursue peace in the form of healthier choices and exercise. I am the QUEEN of excuses, i.e.: I'm tired, My head hurts, I have too much work to do, I need to make dinner and clean the house, etc.  Here's the thing though: if I don't take care of my body, nobody else will.

The evils that I need to depart from are not all related to my physical health. This means things that are not necessarily food or food related.  There are things and people in my life that are not good for me.  Precarious situations that I'm put in that I have to explain to my children, and it's not fair.  At least that's what I tell myself in my personal pity party.  It wasn't fair that Jesus got beaten and nailed to the cross either, but he did it so we would have peace.  And I must go through difficult situations and conversations to have peace.  The thing I struggle with as a mere human being is this: while I know God is in control, I cannot change other people.  Only God can do that.  So I must deal with the evils, and depart from them.  Will they still be there? Of course. Satan is everywhere. But I must try and remove myself from this situations, those things, those people, in order to find peace. At the same time though, I must still pour God's love into everything I do and everyone I meet, in order to truly do His work.  It's not fair for me to otherwise.  All we can do is love others, and hope that someday, something we said or did, will stick.  That God's love and truth will prevail and He will be proud. You can only change your reactions, not others' actions.

So in an effort to do this, I will be conscious about not only the things that go into my mouth, but to my reactions to others and their actions. 

The One with "The Verse"

Matthew 16:24

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me."

I call this "The Verse" because it has smacked me in the face for the past two days repeatedly.  First, it was in my "Made to Crave" devotional yesterday, where I was reminded that I must deny myself foods that I crave just like the disciples had to deny themselves in order to follow Jesus.  I must deny myself the things that I "think" I need, but really, I don't.  Jesus didn't need jalapeno poppers, Big Macs, or Butterfinger Blizzards, to name a few. So, I don't either.  This is not to say that I will NEVER have anything that I crave, but it shouldn't be put first. God should be put first. 

 Which brings me to today. This verse was in our L.I.F.E. group lesson, too! I am already humbled by the fact that it's Easter and all that it stands for, but as we made our way through the lesson, "The Verse" hit me in another way.  BACKTRACK: Last week, I was convicted to go back to NYC this summer for a mission trip to help The Gallery Church, and touch lives in such a populated area. I have been mulling this over all week: how in the WORLD am I going to afford to go? If Stephen (my husband) goes too, and maybe even Ryan (my son), how am I going to afford it then? Can I raise the money? Can I save enough? FAST FORWARD to TODAY: "The Verse" 

Matthew 16:24 

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me."

Whoah.  So I should deny myself other things in order to be able to go to NYC? Yes.  I should follow him to NYC no matter if I'm scared about paying for it? Yes.  Jesus' disciples didn't worry about anything, they just WENT.  This goes back to what our priorities should be. God, Spouse, Children, everything and everyone else. I'm not going to lie. It's hard to comprehend this, but it's true.  The older I get and the closer to God that I get, I understand this more and more.  Be warned: you WILL receive flack from family, from friends, from colleagues,  and so on.  Guess what though--we're not answering to those people.  There's only one person we are going to have to answer to. Yep, that's right--God.  One of my L.I.F.E. group leaders says this on numerous occasions: "I don't want to get in front of God one day, thinking I had done everything that pleased God, and then hear him say, 'Well done, child. You lived and followed me well with what you did. But I had this for you to do, I had this path for you to follow."

Can you imagine? Not doing what you were called to do? 

That is why we must deny ourselves. Not just in giving up food cravings we have, but in making things happen that God calls us to do.  I want God to say to me one day, "Well done, child. You did what I called you to do."

  

I'll leave you with that thought, and also a wish for a very Happy Easter for you and your families!

 

 

 

The One with the Cinnamon Roll

"We must obey God rather than human beings!"
                                                 -Acts 5:29


This was the scripture that hit me in the face this morning during my devotional. Instead of doing what "society" tells me to do or be, I need to be doing what God tells me to do or be.  By giving into every craving or food that taunts me, I'm not only giving in to society's thought, "Just one can't hurt you!", but I'm also giving in to Satan.

Take the cinnamon roll. I went to pick up my daughter Ava at my mom's house, where she had spent the night, having a "cousin slumber party" with my niece Maeve.  My mom had made the girls some cinnamon rolls to go along with their eggs and bacon.  I passed those cinnamon rolls on my way in, and even started to pick one up.  I am a sucker for sweets. (And salty food, and diet soda, and well, food in general.) It wasn't on my own strength that I did grab that cinnamon roll (or two or three).  I even said aloud to myself, "No, you don't need that. Put that back." I'm glad no one else was around at that moment, or I would have probably felt really silly.  It helped though. To verbally tell myself no. But as I embark on this spiritual journey of losing weight, I am  fully aware that nothing I do from here on out will be of my own strength.  Why? I'm just not that strong.  My willpower, or self-control if you will, doesn't come from me, it comes from God.  I think humans has proven that we are weak, and can't make good decisions on our own.  That's the whole reason why Eve bit into that fruit.  She was weak.  (And maybe something got lost in translation, and it was a yummy cinnamon roll dangled in front of her.)

All I know is this...eating that cinnamon roll wouldn't have made me happy.  I would have been so mad at myself afterward, like I always am.  Instead, I'm proud of myself, if only for today.  After all, God promises grace... for today.

Raw and Real

Isaiah 41:10

So do not fear, for I am with you;

    do not be dismayed, for I am your God.
I will strengthen you and help you;
    I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

I started today with this verse, because in my reflections, it is God holding me up, not the other way around. 

I have started a new devotional, "Made to Crave: 60 Days to Craving God, Not Food". I realize that as many times as I have lost this weight (or some of it, rather) that's as many times as I have not called on Him to help me. I've done it "on my own". I should know by now that it is not me that good things come from, it is Him. While he let me lose weight and gain confidence, I owed it all to him, and I didn't recognize that. When the temptations crept in and took over, that was all Satan. He wants me to fail in any way I can, and he FEEDS (pun intended) on my insecurities and my lack of faith that I can DO this once and for all. 

It is not easy. In fact, it's the hardest thing that I have ever dealt with.  It's not easy to have to change clothes a minimum of 5 times every morning, just because you think you look fat, or worse, that "everyone will be staring at the fat girl" runs through my head. It's not easy when Satan fills my head with lies: that people don't like me because I'm overweight, that people who are whispering or talking or laughing, are talking, whispering, and laughing at ME. It's not easy when I take comfort in food, instead of Him. Especially when you have to live with yourself afterward, HATING the fact that you just ate what you did.

Being a mom is hard. Being a wife is hard. Being a daughter, a friend, a business owner, a teacher, a sister, a colleague, and so on...is HARD.

The difference is that being those things ultimately brings me up. Having this extra weight on me brings me down. Not only literally, but the self deprecating behavior has to stop. That is valuable time that I could be doing His work, and being the best me I can be. 

I want to be around to see my kids grow up. I want to get my scuba certification. I want to buy a swimsuit for the first time in I don't know how many years. I want to wear shorts. I want to not cringe when my son asks me to play and run with him. I want to jump on a trampoline without thinking that I will break it. I want to look forward to getting on an airplane, not worrying about whether the seat belt will fit.

Some of the above are delusions. Delusions that Satan has filled my head with ever since I started gaining weight in middle school due to a medical issue. But they are God's to tear down. And the only way I can get through this is by His side, and with YOUR help. 

Thank you for spending this time with me in this very vulnerable, scary, and raw place. 

The journey begins now...