Archive for the The Journey Category

“Don’t let the fear of failure keep you from trying.” Hercules in a recent episode of Once Upon A Time

Last night I took a cruise on the world wide web in search of health and fitness blogs. One of the first sites I clicked on was JillFit, which is run by a fitness instructor who has been in the business since she was 15 years old. And one of the first posts I clicked on featured the infamous ab selfie where she opined about the pressure to have the perfect body in her chosen profession. And I will be candid, when I saw the picture of her, I was a little bit jealous. Because after giving birth to three children and losing 140 pounds, my belly will never look like hers. So when she wrote the following, I was a little confused.

“I am working to help women feel less shameful and less stressed about their eating. And actually like how they exercise and what they put in their mouths. Period.” – Jill Coleman

The ab selfie indicates differently. If a picture is worth a thousand words, that picture says to me that I am failing in my journey to better health. And it made me wonder if ever I met Jill Coleman, what exactly would she say to me?

I’ll admit I was a little discouraged after reading that so I switched to searching for inspirational blogs instead. That is when I somehow stumbled across “Your Fat Friend” and a blog post titled, “What it’s like to be that fat person sitting next to you on the plane.” As I read the blog I felt like a passenger in a car wreck. Because I have been that girl on the airplane and the memories are not at all pleasant. And at the same time I felt like she was telling me I’m a jerk because I’m not fat now, and I don’t want to be squished into a seat next to her.

As I write this I am eating a plate of cauliflower. It’s not exactly what I wanted to eat for lunch(grilled cheese please!) but it is tasty nonetheless. And I can’t stop thinking about the blogs I read last night and how both authors would respond to my choice of nutrition. In one respect I want to apologize for losing the weight and on the other hand I want to apologize for not working harder to lose more.

Several years ago I had the privilege to meet Kathy Smith, exercise guru extraordinaire. I told her my story(the cliff notes version) and she invited me to have coffee with her. We had a really nice chat wherein she expressed to me that I needed to tell my story on a national level because “Margaret, you are amazing. People don’t just do what you have done. And I think you can make money telling your story. What you need is a platform!” And then I shared with her the full story about how Jesus gave me hope and helped me to lose the weight, and how I seek to help others with the help I have been given, and she just kind-of blinked at me because I don’t think she knew what to do with that. She seemed to say, “Give help away for free? But why would anyone do that?”

I’m used to being the odd man out. I never won any popularity contests in school. In fact, I should have won, “Weirdest Girl” several times over. But I’ve come to terms with who I am, what my goals are, and why I persist on my journey to learn discipline. The pressure to look a certain way to conform to the fitness industry unsettles me, and so does the lack of discipline that leads to obesity. Besides, how does the physical standard apply to someone who is paralyzed, like Joni Tada or someone of less fortunate means who can’t afford to buy fruits and vegetables or a good pair of walking shoes?

So this is just my humble opinion, but living a healthy lifestyle should be free. It should be free of pressure to look or feel a certain way. It should be free monetarily. And most importantly, it should be free of guilt. I shouldn’t feel guilty that I’m not a size 6 and I shouldn’t feel guilty that I’m not a size 26. Nobody lost the weight for me. I did it for myself. I had to make choices–hard choices–not to eat Taco Bell and drink chocolate milk shakes. I had to force myself to exercise when I didn’t feel like it. I had to set goals and then work my plan to make it happen. And I’m still doing that today.

I write this blog because I really want to help people who feel hopeless and helpless. I’m not selling anything. I’m just testifying to the truth as I am living it. Losing weight didn’t make my life perfect. Just as I had happy days as a heavy person, I have sad days as a thinner person. But through it all I am learning about the importance of being honest and kind. I would never bicker with someone who told me they were happy weighing 310 pounds. However, I would say that is not a healthy weight for anyone because it’s true. And you will certainly never see me post an ab selfie, though I’m not ashamed of my flabby tummy. After all, I have three kids and I’ve earned those stretch marks.

This blog is a safe place for people of all body shapes and sizes. It’s where I share my hopes, my fears, and my failures. It’s also where I share what I have learned on my journey so far. So when people see me and say, “Hey, Margaret! You look great!” and I get all nervous and awkward, that’s because body shape will always be an uncomfortable subject for me. Because the truth (and I say this a lot in real life) is that it doesn’t matter what I look like on the outside, as long as I have a pretty heart. And as long as that is my goal, I know I still have an awful long way to go.

Nothing captivates my imagination like nature does. Be it the sky, a rock or a toad, I am always curious and filled with awe when I stop, look and listen. Many of my adventures occur in the Spring as I go on my annual hunt for the elusive morel mushroom. I took my first trip on just such an excursion yesterday with my green bandana(to keep the twigs out of my hair) and my trusty walking stick. It is a little early yet so I didn’t expect to find any, but I did find beauty and a whole lot of fresh air and sunshine.

I suppose this is the part of the blog where I should say something inspirational and I guess I will. Hiking as an obese person stinks. I did it for many years. Yesterday I remembered to thank God I am not carrying around an extra person. Sometimes it is just so very awesome to walk around and not feel encumbered by an extra layer of fat. It just feels, well, incredible! It never gets old. So if you are trying to lose weight or just looking for a pep talk, listen closely….all the hard work and pain is worth it. Be it squeezing into that dress you outgrew years ago or line dancing without huffing and puffing, don’t give up! Don’t lose heart. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other and eventually you will accomplish your goals.

We found many pretty wildflowers, although I only took a picture of my favorite, Dutchman’s Breeches. These bleeding heart look-a-likes grow in bunches throughout the woods in the early spring and are a good indicator that morels are not far behind. We hiked up some steep hills, and then when we were tired and hungry, we sat down with our food(an orange for me) on a log and enjoyed each other’s company. Then, when we were tired of hiking we found a creek bed(Big Sugar Creek) and sifted through the rocks for fossils. My husband showed off his rock skipping skill while I poked and prodded the silt for arrowheads and crinoids. There are never enough hours in the day for this type of fun and it was with a heavy–albeit tired–heart that we hiked out of the park and headed for home.

I’ve had a lot of bad days in the past few months where my body was crabby or just plain ill, so for once I wanted to share what a good day looks like. I love the days when I can just walk and breathe deep and enjoy all the hard work I have put in to keep the weight off. Unless one has suffered through year after year of morbid obesity, one cannot imagine the toll it takes. And once you get there, it feels like the most awful trap you can’t escape. Yesterday was a good day to celebrate my escape from that prison. I didn’t take any magic pills or have anyone cut half my stomach out. I simply took one day at a time, one step at a time, and sometimes, even one breath at a time, to slowly inch my way out. I am living proof it is possible to lose weight and keep it off. And I thank God for continuing to teach me how to discipline my mind and body so that I ensure I never, ever go back.

“I can say that I never knew what joy was like until I gave up pursuing happiness, or cared to live until I chose to die. For these two discoveries I am beholden to Jesus.” –Malcolm Muggeridge

I have been reading a fascinating book by John Owen called “Overcoming Sin and Temptation”. The great irony to me in reading this book is that reading it when I needed to know the information the most was when I was least interested in the content. My pursuit of happiness and fulfillment led me over many a rocky and purposeless road whereupon I cut my tender feet; even as I knew God’s grace would cover the wounds. But grace did not deliver me from my thoughts, and I was consumed with the pain and regret from each fall so that I wandered aimlessly, much like the Israelites of old, and never arrived at my destination. Unaided as I was by other Christians, who sought only to tell me what I was doing wrong, now I have but one wish; that they would have taken the time to compassionately understand who I was and why I did the things I did. The gentle touch of love would have been so much more effective than the verbal lashings of those who purported to be friends. And maybe, just maybe, they could have carefully guided me away from some of the cliffs I so willingly jumped off.

In my youth I was very proud of my ability to lie well. Not only would I tell a lie to cover my theft of food from the kitchen cookie jar, but I would concoct a pliable story surrounding that lie. I always thought my mother believed my eloquent stories, but now as I look into the faces of my own little liars(my children) I know exactly how she felt; exasperated.

Lately I have been troubled by a lie I told in my youth. It was a simple lie–not one of those
‘have-to-remember-all-the-details-so-you-can-cover-your-tracks-later’ kind of stories. As I consider the lie and the context, I’ve had to come to terms with who I was then and who I am now. I also have come to terms with hypocrisy(as it relates to me) and what it means to truly follow Jesus.

I ran into Nancy Bowen at Wal-Mart in Ferguson, Missouri when I was 19 years old. She was my former Sunday school teacher. She asked me a simple question, one of those flippant questions church people ask when they haven’t seen each other in a few years, “So where do you go to church these days?”

So I lied. Because I didn’t want to tell her I’d given up on church and church people. I didn’t want to tell her I still believed in God but I’d lost all faith in him because of how people treated me in His name. It was easier to say the name of a building I’d seen on the side of the road than open the wounded cavern of my heart to someone who might actually help me. We said some other casual catch up things and then she left. I went back to work. Except the conversation never left me. And it has stayed with me all these years until a few days ago when I decided it was finally time to deal with it.

Nancy Bowen was truly the perfect Sunday school teacher. She was kind, gentle and funny. She was also very no-nonsense about a great many things in life. She was a hero to me in that way caring adults are to small children who feel insecure and alone in life. So of course, I loved her.

I remember well the felt boards in Sunday school where Mrs. Bowen, would illustrate the great stories of the Bible. People like Joseph (with his multi-colored coat), and Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus clung to the board mid action while Mrs. Bowen read the stories behind them. I remember the coffee on her breath and the perfect bob of her dark amber-colored hair. And I seem to recall the baby Jesus, who wouldn’t stick to the board very well because his cutout was small, and so he was always falling onto the floor until finally Mrs. Bowen would set him to the side in defeat. I remember when she gave us seeds and we watched them grow into polka dot plants. I have a great fondness for green and pink spotted plants to this day because of her. So when I think about the last interactions I had with her, my heart hurts.

I lied to her.

I read a book some years back called, “Where the Heart Is” by Billie Letts. It’s a pretty good story about a 7-months-pregnant girl, Novalee, who is abandoned at Wal-Mart by her boyfriend, Wily Jack. Because she has no other resources, she lives in the Wal-Mart until she gives birth. At the end of the story, Novalee finds Wily Jack in a hospital where it is apparent fortune has not been so kind to him. At the beginning of the story, when they are driving in his car, she asked him to feel her belly–to feel the heartbeat of their baby. When she asked him if he heard it he said, “No.” But at the end of the story he confesses to her that he had lied. When she asks him why, he said this:

“Why does anyone lie? Cuz we’re scared? Or crazy? Or just mean?… There’s a million reasons why a person lies… But sometimes, you tell a lie so big… that it changes your whole life… Lie’s so big… it makes you think…”

His words convince Novalee to confront her own heart and a big lie she told to someone she loved. That’s how I feel about my lie to Nancy Bowen. If only I had confronted the big lie in my heart when I was 19, I would have saved myself years of heartache, trouble and grief.

I have to learn everything the hard way. I’m not really sure when I came to the conclusion that I knew what was better for me than God did. Maybe I was born with that assumption. Maybe it germinated in the fantasy novels I read as a child and then grew limbs in the romance movies I absorbed as a teenager. Regardless of when it began to grow, somewhere along the way I came to believe that God was not enough for me. I mean, I believed in Him. I knew He was real. I knew all the stories. But I honestly thought my way was better. And not because of some great revelation. It’s because when I wanted something, I always found some way to justify having it, even if the Bible said it was wrong. I couldn’t draw a parallel with my will and God’s will. I always thought that he should give me what I wanted, and when he didn’t, he was wrong. So when I suffered the consequences of behavior I knew to be aberrant from Jesus’s teachings, I figured that’s what grace(and forgiveness) was for. This belief, however, proved very problematic when my weight ballooned to 310 pounds because I could not deny myself the sweets I relied on to help me cope with life.

We like to tell the story of the boy who cried wolf in my house to illustrate why lies hurt people. Shoot, they can even get you killed(as the boy who cried wolf discovered). And the truth is, my lies not only hurt the people I told them to, but they hurt me as well. That is because the lies I told myself covered the truth so effectively that I couldn’t face my real problems. Truth, as I have lately discovered, is a sparkling jewel that can take some digging to discover. But once you find it, you never want to let it go.

John Owen is teaching me how to mortify sin. My main focus in reading the book, “Overcoming Sin and Temptation”, has always been to discover the root of how to defeat my addiction to food. The addiction is mental and physiological, but I am learning it is also primarily an issue of the heart. This week I had a real breakthrough when, in chapter 11, I came to these words, “If ever you will mortify your corruptions, you must tie up your conscience to the law.” Now I’m not a puritan. And you certainly won’t find me with a reed–whipping myself, but when John Owen directs the reader to read the law(the ten commandments), I stopped and did so. You can find them in Exodus 20. And I don’t remember the last time I read them. But the first one says, “You shall have no other gods before me.” And that is when I realized the root of the big lie for me. In my youth, I was my own god. Mr. Owen pierced my heart with the following words.

“What have I done? What love, what mercy, what blood, what grace have I despised and trampled on! Is this the return I make to the Father for his love, to the Son for his blood, to the Holy Ghost for his grace? Do I thus repay the Lord? Have I defiled the heart that Christ died to wash, that the blessed Spirit has chosen to dwell in? And can I keep myself out of the dust? What can I say to the dear Lord Jesus? How shall I hold up my head with any boldness before him? Do I account communion with him of so little value, that for this vile lust’s sake I have scarce left him any room in my heart? How shall I escape if I neglect so great salvation? In the meantime, what shall I say to the Lord? Love, mercy, grace, goodness, peace, joy, consolation–I have despised them all, and esteemed them as a thing of naught, that I might harbor a lust in my heart. Have I obtained a view of God’s fatherly countenance, that I might behold his face and provoke him to his face? Was my soul washed, that room might be made for new defilements? Shall I endeavor to disappoint the end of the death of Christ? Shall I daily grieve that Spirit whereby I am sealed to the day of redemption?”

When I was young, I always did what I wanted to do, and by doing so, I forsook the very first commandment. Jesus said it very succinctly in the gospel of Matthew(22:37-38), “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.”

And the lie I believed is finally distilled down to its essence. And I am so glad because I can finally break the power of it. Because the truth is this; I no longer love myself more than I love Jesus.

How many years did I waste? How many hearts did I break? Seeking only myself and the lusts of my heart?

It’s a really painful thing to consider, especially since there is nothing I can do to make it right. I look at my life–at all the wicked things I have thought and done… Gluttony is self-gratification(loving myself more than Jesus). Pre-marital sex is self-gratification(loving myself more than Jesus). Drunkenness–stealing–lying–hate… To my shame, they all exemplify a life lived only for myself, and not for the suffering King who bore the weight of them on the cross to ensure my salvation.

I had to live in and love the world for a long time before I discovered the true sweetness of Jesus. I had to learn the hard way how eating with abandon, lying to my friends, watching porn, taking drugs, and dealing with unplanned pregnancy hurt me. Because that’s what lies do; they destroy.

So why does this matter today? Because today is Good Friday. Today I think about God who became flesh to bear the weight of my sin on Calvary. He took every lie, every thought, every action, and crucified it so I could have a relationship with him. Because he loves me. He even took the lie I told Nancy Bowen when we were standing in the toy aisle in Wal-Mart 22 years ago. And that is the most freeing, most comforting, most wonderful truth. A truth that won’t be described in words on a blog, though I have certainly done my best to try.

I continue down the rocky path on my journey to learn discipline, but I have certainly enjoyed drinking from the cool brook that refreshed me this week. I never imagined it would look like reading the law. And for that I am glad. Because if today is any indication, God is not done with me yet. I have many more brooks to visit, more steep hills to climb, and probably a few valleys-of-the-shadow to stumble through. But the truth that has taken hold of my heart today, is that I am never alone on this journey. Jesus is with me. And honestly, that’s all that really matters.