where your mind is, the body will go.

We all know running for its immense health benefits but what most of us lack is the discipline that is required to grow the habit of running and all other exercises. Like vitamins, these physical exercises require that you are consistent with them. We can't store their benefits in this our fading elastic body and expect to use them at a much later stage. 

A couple of months back I got serious with the whole body fitness thing. My mind had never been this ready for anything and my heart so anxious. The routine wasn't the problem, but the daily adjustments were. I would be very anxious to see the growth from one day to another. The growth was slow and gradual, so much so that sometimes I lost the patience. I wanted to feel the improvements and increase in my pace that until I started to feel lighter and faster I began to enjoy the pain. 

For me it was always the purpose that surpassed every pain I was up against and that was all the emotional muscle that I needed to build. The physical can be deceitful, but the mind must be up for a challenge. 

Often times, I reached where my body thought its limits were, but constantly I asked myself, what is the worst case scenario if I pushed beyond where my body wanted to resign. Well, I did, over and over again until my limitations were my stepping stones. 

I learnt that on the other side of your limits, is another floor for you to step on. Go beyond those ceilings. 

Calm in the middle of a storm

Just had one of those long calls that last until the cows come home. This, my friend, whom I called hoping I could offer her some encouraging words in this mind-numbing season, turned the tables to give me a peace of her mind. Yeah, you read that right.... a peace of her beautiful mind.

One thing stayed on mine and that was rest. To rest in the storm, in the uncertainty. And to let go when nothing around you seems to make sense because you know the author of your story and the finisher of your faith.

We have all gained different experiences from this lockdown whose finish line is so blurry that some of us are taking it out on the referees, faulting them for constantly shifting the goalposts. And we are all right. All our feelings are valid, the frustrations, fear, pressure to perform, while time is simply seated still watching our lives waste away at the tick of the clock. 

I'll remind you of these young men who got on a boat  with a very trusted person in whose presence they probably didn't expect any harm, hurt or helplessness to happen. But right in the middle of the waters, a waging storm came right after them attempting to engulf the entire boat. Afraid and startled, they cried out to him to save them. Not because he was the boat's captain  but because they knew him to be all powerful. Awaking him from sleep, he asked them why they had little faith. Well, he went ahead and calmed the storm.

Eventially, all storms settle. Sail on.

I have been pondering on the possibility for anyone to actually sleep in the middle of a storm. What kind of faith does one need to sail through? The ability to have body stability when everything around you is swaying you left, right and centre;

It all depends on the real captain of your boat, the one whom you'll choose to look upto when the ground threatens to swallow you because fear is not of God. Seek him! For whatever storm you may encounter in this life, he says, "Peace, be still." 

Jump into that boat, regardless of the storms ahead, rest in his goodness. He is in control. He has always been and forever will.