My Fitness Journey
I’m writing this article in the first week of 2023. It seems like 2022 passed in the blink of an eye. As I look forward to another year, I wanted to share one area of my life that I’ve found success in. I hope to encourage you with my fitness story.
First of all, I want to praise God for my good health. As I approach a milestone birthday in a few years, I realize that good health is something to not take for granted. Many relatives and friends in my age group are suffering from various illnesses, aches and pains. I’m thankful for the Seventh-day Adventist health message that has led me to a plant based diet and has shown the importance of exercise and other healthy lifestyle habits. I truly marvel at how enlightened and progressive our health messages have been and continue to shed light on how to keep our bodies healthy.
In the past year, I have been doing a fitness routine that has worked for my schedule and more importantly has become a reliable habit. For decades, I’ve realized how I need to incorporate cardiovascular exercises, weight bearing exercises, and stretching into my daily routine. When I was younger, I used to have a gym membership but with having to care for my elder in-laws, I found a gym membership impossible to maintain. But about a year and half ago, my friend introduced me to Peloton, a fitness app. With a 30 year old treadmill in a dark basement, with a few sets of weights, and a surface to do stretching exercises, I had a complete gym. For my schedule and budget, this was a perfect set up. I’ve been able to maintain an exercise routine that has met my goals. Being able to work up a sweat and being able to take a shower right afterward in my own house is a great thing.
I’ve never really had a full career, I’ve been a homemaker most of my married life. And at times, I’ve wondered if I could have made a success of having a career and the money and recognition that came with it. But now, I realize one of the advantages of being a stay at home mom has allowed me to have a fitness regimen. Also, I realize the stress of having a career is much greater than being a housewife, so I’m thankful for that as well.
In 2023, I hope to be even more diligent with my fitness. Whereas I exercise 3-4 times a week, I hope to do it more consistently so that I do something every day, even if it’s light stretching. On the Peloton app, you get a blue dot for doing something and I hope to have a calendar full of blue dots.
I’ve had some challenges too on my fitness journey. I started to feel some discomfort in my right shoulder a few months back and I stopped lifting weights for a while. I felt bad that I couldn’t do my weight routine and I was thinking of how to incorporate weights without giving stress to my right shoulder. One day I realized that I could still exercise my left arm with my normal weight (5 pounds) and a much lighter one for my right (1 pound). I feel my right shoulder being strengthened and am really happy that I could continue my light weight lifting routine.
This experience has also given me a spiritual metaphor for being the body of the church. The church has been likened to a body throughout the Bible. But as with any kind of organization, there are those who have more responsibilities and more talents. This causes some people with lesser talents to think that they are not needed and shouldn’t be expected to participate since there are those who can do the “heavy lifting.” But Ephesians 2:19-21 says, “So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself benign the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord.” With Jesus Christ as our foundation, every member of the church can have a place and a job to do in the church.
You would think that with all this exercise, I would see a lot of changes in my body and in my strength but I honestly don’t see that many changes. The scale shows little change and so does my pants size. But one day when I was doing some squatting I realized that I’m able to handle that position a lot longer than I was able to before I started exercising. Unbeknownst to me, my thigh and leg muscles were getting strengthened while I was doing my exercises. It didn’t feel like that because the improvements were so small that it was barely noticeable.
There’s a spiritual lesson in this as well. We may not think that our efforts to be faithful to God are not making a difference because you don’t really feel it. Our attending church, paying offerings, doing our devotions, doing our prayers- these things may feel like routine and not helping us grow spiritually. But don’t give up on these things. Your spiritual muscles are being strengthened while you may not see it or feel it. “Cast your bread upon the waters, For you will find it after many days.” Ecclesiastes 11:1 Anything that you do for God will have multiple rewards, in the present world and in the hereafter.
So, as we begin a new year, I hope and pray that you will find encouragement and motivation to get healthier, physically and spiritually. In whatever ways you can find yourself to do, start small and be consistent and God will help you and strengthen you.