I’ve seen a meme going around for several years that says, “My biggest fear is marrying into a family that runs 5ks on Thanksgiving.”
I have laughed and teased my children as they have chosen their spouses, telling them to be careful or they will do that very thing. Usually when we are joking about it, everyone is sitting around the table on Thanksgiving, eating too much, and the very thought of running at all is inconceivable in that moment…lol.
Now, anyone who knows me at all at this point in my life, knows that “Rhonda does NOT run.” Ever. If there is a fire, and I can’t walk to safety, then I likely will not make it. I laugh, but the truth is, my physical capabilities at this point would not allow me to run, even if I wanted to do so. Twenty years ago, that could not have been further from the truth, but twenty years is a long time. A lot of choices get made in that span of time. A lot of curves in the roads we choose.
I don’t ever remember being one of those girls who wanted to grow up to be beautiful or popular or anything like that. I definitely was not the “hey, let’s be in a beauty pageant” type girl, in mind or body….so thankfully I did not have a mom who wanted to do those things either.
I think in my younger years, I was a lot like most other kids, physically and mentally. If I look back at pictures and “run the tapes back” in my memory, during those crazy awkward middle school years, I was one of those kids who was on the larger side, physically, and wasn’t interested at all in the things that most girls my age were into. I was not one of the “pretty people”. You know the ones…..they seem perfect….well-proportioned bodies, visually pleasing facial features, all the things society calls beautiful.
What was I? All those years ago, the term was “tomboy”. Don’t get me wrong, I had Barbies and kitchen sets and all that stuff growing up and enjoyed those things. But I also much preferred playing football, kickball, basketball, or anything else we could come up with outside. I didn’t like dresses, and my precious grandmother was an amazing seamstress, so she did her best to adapt to what her granddaughter liked if she wanted her to wear it…lol.
In recent years, I have often thought, if I were born as I was then, but into today’s society, and had parents who were “woke” (is that even the right term?), would they have tried to “allowed me to be a boy”?
I am thankful that was not a thing back then, and I did not have parents with that mindset. Anyway…. off topic.
Going through the middle school and high school years and just not seeming to fit in anywhere, really, I mostly withdrew from everyone and just did my own thing. I had a few friends that we did things together sometimes, but we were all having the same struggles, for the most part.
Teenagers can be vicious people. While I “got along” with most everyone, there were bullies lurking in lots of places in my life. The really sad thing is, looking back, I could at least respect the fact that the bullies were never lying about who they were or their intentions. If they did not like you, they were there, in your face, to tell you and to let you know exactly why. I think many of them had the same internal struggles I had, but they just chose to lash out instead of withdrawing.
Then there were the “pretty people”. We all started out in kindergarten together in this small town, but as we got older, there were lines drawn between us, usually related to one or both of these things: physical beauty and financial standing in the community.
Well, I had neither of those, so being one of the pretty people wasn’t really an option. Not that I wanted to, because some of them were worse than any bully. They thought very highly of themselves and tried to make sure that everyone else did, too. If you didn’t fit into their idea of pretty or rich, then you were beneath them, and they treated you accordingly. The movie “Mean Girls” was really not too far off course when it comes to teenage girls.
Anyway, I became the person who kept to myself as much as possible. I didn’t speak to you unless you spoke to me, and then I said as few words as possible. I felt things very deeply but learned quickly that I seemed to be alone in that respect, as well.
I really thought I was fine…...until I wasn’t. The stress that I internalized was apparently slowly killing me. I didn’t even know what it was at the time, but as an adult, I know the feeling as anxiety.
So, that internalized anxiety grew and grew until one day I woke up in the hallway of my high school, on the floor because I had passed out. No one was around because it was during class, and I had asked to go to the restroom because I wasn’t feeling well.
As I have looked back on that period of my life, I had become skeletal. The doctor called it Anorexia. I had no idea what it meant…. I just wanted everyone to leave me alone.
The most frustrating thing about where I was at the time: people started telling me how beautiful I was, and that I looked so much better, and all those kinds of things.
So, I had to be dying for the world to see me as beautiful. That seems really backwards, doesn’t it?
Since then, I have gone through seasons of my life where my body has been large, small, and everything in between. It’s always amazing to me, in every season, how society responds to those things.
But look around at where we are today. Society still has expectations, and we are still scrambling to meet them, aren’t we?
As I am currently in a season where my physical body is larger than I would like it to be, and I am having health issues I would rather not have, I have considered all the same things that society throws out there as “solutions” : weight loss surgery, diet pills, and now these shots that it seems like a really large number of people are taking.
Please don’t misunderstand me. If any of those things are choices you made in your life, this is not to bash you or any of those things. I love you, and I pray God leads us all in the directions He would have us to go.
Well, none of those things have been found “acceptable in His sight” for Rhonda. Believe me…I have talked to God about this A LOT. I have sought counsel from Godly people He has placed in my life, some very knowledgeable about the physical and spiritual ramifications of our choices.
I have a friend. A close friend. A dear friend. I will leave it to her to call herself out if she feels like she should. She always, always, ALWAYS says “We can do hard things.”
You know what God has had to say to me about it?
24 Don’t you realize that in a race everyone runs, but only one person gets the prize? So run to win! 25 All athletes are disciplined in their training. They do it to win a prize that will fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. 26 So I run with purpose in every step. I am not just shadowboxing. 27 I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should. Otherwise, I fear that after preaching to others I myself might be disqualified.
I Corinthians 9:24-27 NLT
Run. There’s that word. Remember WAY BACK at the beginning of this post, when I mentioned running? If you’ll recall, I’m not a fan.
This life on earth is a race, and we are all running it. But He doesn’t say to just run. He says to “Run to WIN!”
I imagine myself lined up at the starting line next to some intimidating looking athletes. In the natural, onlookers probably feel bad for me, because the deck is stacked against me. I imagine some are laughing at just the appearance of someone like me, lined up to race against these physically perfected athletes.
In the natural, if I look at them, and measure my chances against what I see, then I have already been defeated. Because that’s not what God wants me to do when He says to run.
He doesn’t say to look at everyone else and run with those who you think you can beat. He just says to run as if to win. That’s a REQUIREMENT on MY part that has nothing to do with anyone else in the race. My focus should only be on Him.
Regardless of what it looks like, run as if to win.
I remember a few years ago, my friend was getting ready to have some professional pictures made to promote her gym. Pictures of them working out. She said she quickly discovered that working out is not pretty. It’s hard, and your face and body reflect that.
We can do hard things.
Actively pursuing something is not always pretty.
Run as if to win.
Is this just about the physical? Of course not. The physical and the spiritual go hand in hand in this lesson God has for us…. or maybe it’s just me.
Remember when I said I was a teenager who was skeletal, and dying from an eating disorder? Remember that was the point in time when everyone told me how beautiful I was, and that I looked good?
Before that, they were offended by the fact that I didn’t look like them, physically, so I wasn’t beautiful at all.
So, I have to be dying to look good to the world. Got it.
Am I supposed to be concerned with the world’s viewpoint? Or am I supposed to be running the race God has set before me, with everything I have, so that I might win? No matter what it looks like to anyone else. No matter what they say. Even if everyone laughs at how ridiculous your efforts might look to them.
Run the race as if to win… we won’t reach perfection this side of heaven, but we should pursue EVERYTHING God has for us with everything we have, regardless of whether it’s popular with anyone else, and He will sustain and strengthen us in this race.
This was not a post that I planned on writing, but God had other plans. I welcome your comments, but please remember I am a human trying to figure this all out, just like you.
I love you, my friends.
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