Day 44: Why I Am an Overcomer

Some days, God tests me.

The following is very spiritually involved, so if you're not interested in that sort of thing, I give you permission to overlook that bit. But still read on, you may learn something.

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I am a huge Joyce Meyer fan. I think she is hysterical, and preaches a good message most times she speaks. I admit there are times when I've turned off the program because I wasn't yet ready to hear what she had to say. But most of the time, she brings it on home.

God seems to like it when I watch Joyce on the internet and seems to give me "homework" after viewing one of her shows. As in, well you've learned the lesson mentally, so let's see if you can put it into practice.

One of my favorite lessons by her is not to become offended at oneself. To become determined that no matter what kind of things are thrown in your way, to not become derailed from the purpose that God has called you to. She advocates being active and articulating things aloud, and she mentions having a very determined sit-down with herself and saying that she is NOT going to be kept by the devil from enjoying her life. She said there was a shift in her attitude from that point on.

Well, I experienced a more benign but similar episode today. For whatever reason, this nagging feeling inside me was that I was a loser and I was a horrible runner. I don't usually think that, normally I'm so excited to be running I can look past the fact that I'm slow. It nagged on and when I got to the hard part of my run,  I was fighting it and just so disappointed that I was, in my opinion, too slow. Eventually, it got intense and I just said to myself for about 5 minutes, "I'm an overcomer," like the Mandisa song. Sometimes I had to say it to myself more harshly than other times, sometimes I had to yell (to myself) at the devil that he was NOT going to take me down. About halfway through my cool down my insistence took, and I realized that yes, I was an overcomer, and yes, I was good at what I did. I decided to continue walking and put in an additional 35 second run at high speed. My total was 1.70 miles, 495 kcals, and 40:18, 9 minutes over the C25K time. :-) I also found out that I had beaten my original fast pace on the run at 2.7 mph instead of my usual 2.3.

After my run. Day 32/50 and 23.2 miles into the Lazy Girl Marathon! :-)

 

 

Mandisa has also put out a series of pictures on her website, and I have used one of those repeatedly on my page. This is the picture in question:

I can't even tell you how many times I've felt that way on the elliptical, lol. :-) But it just means that everyone who has been on a weight loss journey at some point has felt like that picture. But thank God that we are overcomers and have Someone who has overcome even the worst of circumstances. So, if you feel like giving up sometimes, remember that Christ has made us more than conquerors and we can overcome anything! :-)

I hope everyone has a terrific day. True to form, I'm going back to chem homework, lol. Be blessed everyone! :-)

Day 24: Praise You While I'm Sore

My ankle is injured! No bueno. I don't exactly know what happened except that it is bruised, and does not respond well to walking. It does better when I run instead of walk (I guess cause I tend to land more on my heel when I walk and more on the ball of my foot when I run!) but I'm not going to be dumb and try to pound out a 24-minute run today. I ran for about 10 minutes, which is about half of what I'm used to running. I am going to do some cardio/strength combos tonight that don't directly involve my ankle so I'm going to do those at full strength. Today is legs/thighs/chest/butt day which really sucks when you're an active runner and biker! But I persist because I love the way my calves look! They are shapely and beautiful. :-)

I lost 2 lbs today, but the gym scale has been recalibrated to weight what my mom's scale does! It would normally weigh me at 210 because of the way it was calibrated yesterday but today it weighed me at the exact same weight! I was totally bummed out, but hopefully it will be at 20 lbs tomorrow. I am so ridiculously close it's crazy! I'm around 18-19 lbs lost, which is great but I can totally get past that! Because of my persistence I have shattered several plateaus and if I get down to 212.0 on my mom's scale I have completely obliterated the whole plateau and the 5-6 lb cycle I have been doing for weeks now. So I am hoping for another whoooooosh. :-)

I am so excited about how my life is going, despite the few minor setbacks I described above. I remember a few weeks ago pondering life as a Christian and wondering if Joyce Meyer was right, that God would give me a better life if I loved him. Looking back, saying YES to Jesus was one of the best decisions I have ever made! I am amazed at how my life continues to change for the positive.

I love being back at church and serving God in different ways. I'm going to help serve at a mission project which involves filling bags with rice, protein, and vegetables for those in need in Haiti. We are going to fill ~40,000 bags of rice mix and they will be shipped to Haiti! There is also this whole missions weekend and I am definitely going! Because of school and the way my schedule is set up it is very difficult for me to go overseas, but I hear there are some local projects that will be available. I love volunteer work of all sorts, so helping in this field sounds fantastic to me. I am also attending a class that the church is offering in September about the privileges of being a church member. I'm so excited about all of this.

I hope everyone has a fantastic day and knocks out some good exercise. If you're injured like me, be smart and take it easy. Never settle for getting hurt worse. Be blessed all!

Day 21: Lucky Treadmills and Blessed Sundays

I ran 21 minutes on what I have now figured out is my "unlucky" treadmill. I usually use the brand new treadmill that my gym has because it's my favorite. I can go 20 minutes plus at 3.2 mph. Today that treadmill was taken and there was an insane amount of people in the gym for it being a Sunday, so I decided to suck it up and go on the little-bitty treadmill adjacent to the door. It was a dinky thing and wouldn't have allowed me to stick my arms at my sides if I was any wider. And man... I couldn't even get above 3.0, was sweating profusely and grabbing the side bars some of the time (I hate doing that... it's wimpy running, lol!). Next time, I'm using my lucky treadmill and knocking out 22 minutes! :-)

I also went to church for the first time in six months to a year. Before, I am ashamed to say I had ulterior motives for going to church, but now I go cause I like the people there and totally enjoy the church's minister. He shouts a lot and is very interesting to listen to. Today he spoke on joy, and how we have joy through having a relationship with Christ and how sometimes things may be rough but Christ wins in the end, citing extensive passages from Revelation. I always thought Revelation was super cool, with Christ riding in on a white horse to save the world. I don't know how literal Revelation is but I think it would be super cool to see Jesus ride in on a white horse and banish Satan to the Lake of Fire. God sure does know how to write an awesome epic. :-D

Tonight I'm going to a potluck supper at the church. I don't have any food for it, but I am looking forward to fellowshipping and getting to know some of the people at my church. I know some of the people in my Sunday School classes, I know the people I sit with on the right side of the church, and I know the associate pastor and music minister, but potlucks are fun because you get to know a variety of people. I just have to, as my 11th grade Geometry teacher often said when we left, make good choices! Eat less and fellowship more. Should be interesting to put my social and eating skills to the test, lol.

Well, I've got to get back to chemistry homework, which was what I got online to do to begin with! :-D I hope everyone has a blessed day and I will see you guys tomorrow! :-)