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.