I haven’t written anything in the last few weeks s because I have been busy traveling and with church stuff, well actually I have been thinking through what wisdom I should share from my recent experiences with life and running and kids, etc, ok ok truth is I’m having a crappy time, I hate to admit it and I absolutely loathe the taste of humble pie.
As you know I have been training for a marathon. Everyone knows. Even if I hadn't publicly announced it, which I did with zeal, everyone would know because 1. I live in a tiny town so I can't exactly sneak around. People see us running during the week to the point that we have "fans" we don't even know and 2. It's literally what my schedule and most my conversations have revolved around for months. So here's the problem- I cannot do it. It honestly makes me feel the heat of tears in my eyes saying that, but sadly at this point it is true. I have been struggling since early June. I can't keep up, I am so sore. I don't finish the longer distances on Saturdays. If all of us were having these problems I would be ok with it, but all my friends are getting stronger and fitter and faster, while I am getting slower and weaker and exhausted. I am not sure what is going on with my mind and body but I literally cannot do this right now. After Saturday runs I am so worn out, I am angry and frustrated and honestly I am embarrassed. I have been trying to push through and stay positive and not give up, but it is all just feeling impossible. You might say "Just don't run the marathon, what's the big deal?' Well for me there are things that I can't get out of my head that are making my realization that I am most likely not going to be ready for 26.2 miles by November a VERY BIG DEAL to me, so here goes:
I am such a prideful person. I try to keep it under wraps. I try to pray it away. I try to remember where I came from and how insignificant I am. But the truth is I think I am better than I should. I think I am smart and strong and capable. I think I have good ideas and I am wise and a good person. I think I am tough and capable. I think I can do anything I decide to do. I am welling over with stinky, thick pride. The kind that makes me think I should be faster and more able and mentally/emotionally stronger and more stable and more capable than other people, include myself. I have worked very hard at getting my crap together in an organized/messy, mature/childlike, capable/silly, nonchalant/very calculated way. And anything that threatens that is quickly dominated or dismissed by me. I work hard, I make home cooked meals almost every day, my kids are shining citizens and great students, I have been married to the same man, who is a pastor I might add for 18 years, we pay our bills, I eat my vegetables, I go to work on time, I work a second job, I "train" for a marathon- what's not to be impressed with right? (Wrong!! but hang with me for a few minutes before you get pissed and start texting your friends saying what an arrogant B I am.) When I was younger, I was the kid that reverse psychology was invented for. If some one dared tell me I couldn't do something, that is exactly what I was determined to do. "Don't get married so young it won't work" "There is no way you can finish college with a husband, a baby and a full-time job" "You can't handle three babies less than 4 years apart a day's drive from any family" "You won't be able to get a job teaching if you stay home for the 10 years it will take to get all the girls in school" Challenge accepted and later achieved. I do not like to be told what I can and cannot do. I do not like limitations or doubts about my capabilities. And because of that I work very hard to keep all the things I juggle up in the air and synchronized as well as possible. So if I want to run a marathon, I will run a marathon. I will just put the work in and do it. If I believe I can achieve, isn't that what they have been telling us since Kindergarten? I have been so dead-set on accomplishing this bucket list item that I went to the doctor a couple weeks ago hoping he would fix me and send me out ready to conquer the world, including Wednesdays' hill runs, Tuesdays' intervals and Saturdays' runs that should now be taking me all the way to Tyler. Well that didn't turn out how I hoped. He basically said, you're anemic, you have fibromyalgia, you're nearing 40, you don't sleep enough and you're asking a lot of your body- maybe more than it has to give. He changed some of my medicine up, gave me a flyer on how to sleep more and sent me away with no answers, pretty much saying run less and wait it out. I DO NOT want to run less and wait it out, I DO NOT want to come in last every run, I DO NOT want to feel like I have the flu for weeks on end, I DO NOT want to fail at this. I DO NOT want to fail at anything, especially things that people know I am working towards. So what does any mature God fearing adult do when faced with the tiniest little difficulty, I don't know because I just pouted for several days, moping around, pissed about something as insignificant as a race. A race Heather, that is like something you do for fun, its a game, but I was (and honestly still am a little) so disappointed in myself because I was going to have to tell people how the training was going when they asked, and I know they will ask. I am going to have to eat humble pie. When I go back to school next week- humble pie. When I run 2 miles tomorrow while everyone else is running 16 SIXTEEN- humble pie. When the race day comes around and I am potentially on the side line- humble pie. I HATE the taste of humble pie. It tastes bitter and sour and like I don't want it. I much prefer the sweet taste of winning at everything!
But then a fleeting thought passed my mind about some Bible guy who probably didn't like humble pie either but some how learned to be content with whatever God sent his way. Paul who once listed off all the reasons he had to be proud and impressed with himself (sound familar0, but quickly said it was all trash compared to knowing Christ (totally still working on that part). He later said in Phillipians "I know what it is to be in need and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret to being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through him who gives me strength." Now I don't know about you but I just want to pluck out that last sentence and "name it claim it"- I can run a marathon because it is Christ who gives me strength. Pretty much I can do anything. Sadly, that is not the heart behind this verse, because we have to read it with the verses around us. He wasn't saying he had the ability to do anything he set his mind to, he was saying he could be content no matter how things were going, because that is what Christ was giving him strength to be. My body cannot run a marathon right now, and it probably won't happen this fall, hopefully it will happen before I die, but maybe not. I cannot just decide to do something and then do it, not always. Not this time. But I can hopefully learn some humility and contentment even when things don't turn out how I want and I am not as capable as I had hoped. Learning things the hard way sucks ya'll, for those of you who are headstrong and stubborn and inwardly cocky like me, I am sorry, but the hard way seems like the normal way for us.
So tomorrow I am going to start over, I am going to run 2 miles and then later in the week 3 so on and so on. I might get to 26.2 by February or May or my 40th birthday or I will walk one when I am 80 or I will have my great grandson push me in one with I'm 99. Please pray that I can just be content in Who I belong to and what things He gives me strength for each day. (And I am sorry if you still think I am an arrogant B, you're not wrong, and that's not good, but I am a work in progress.)
