I must carry a lot of pride around with me, because I am constantly feeling humbled. At least once a day, sometimes multiple times a day, something slaps me across the face as if to say, “pipe down choir girl.”
Yesterday, I walked over to Curves which is about a 5-10 minute walk from my house. I signed up for the 30 day trial and the receptionist showed me around the equipment. It’s a great work out and I was happy to start on this trajectory as I need weight and resistance training in my repertoire of working out.
Today, I returned to Curves to take advantage of my free trial. And the humbling began. Yesterday, I didn’t notice some of these things because I was working with the trainer, but today, doing the workout all alone, I noticed several things.
1. The ladies who work out there when I do (between 6-7am) are all over 50 years old and half are over 60.
2. All of them are in better shape than me.
3. One woman said she’d been coming to curves for 3 times per week for 9 years.
4. One woman had on a t-shirt that said “Curves 400″ and another “Curves 900″ which means they’ve been to Curves 400 and 900 times. Let that one sink in for a minute. What commitment!
5. I got measured. Weight, bust, waist, thighs, BMI the whole 9. There is nothing more humbling than becoming cozy with those numbers. Blerg.
And so I am humbled. I feel like I have so far to go. I feel like it’s going to take forever. In my irrational moments, I feel like it won’t happen. Like, it literally won’t happen ever.
But a friend reminded me today that the voice that tells me these lies and seeks to discourage and destroy, this voice, is not my own. It is the enemy’s voice. As I train my body, I must also train my ears to hear my Heavenly Father’s voice and his gentle encouragement and steady, rock-like wisdom. Because if I tune my heart to Him, I can hear Him saying:
You’ve got this! You’re doing it! Keep going! Don’t give up! I’m right here with you! Look how far you’ve come!
And that is a voice that, even in the midst of the humbling, can lift me up.