December 31, 2016 Reflections on Trail Running (into the New Year)

The big event for me this last day of 2016, a trail run on the mountain above the town I grew up in with 2 treasured friends.  It’s only 8:30 pm now, but I have no further plans to ring in the New Year.  I will probably be in bed by the time the ball drops in New York, but I still feel the need to take a moment to reflect before 2016 rolls into 2017.  This year flew by, as the years tend to do, faster and faster, the older we become.  We are so impatient to get to the next birthday, the next grade, and the next stage in our life when we are young, then once we have reached the majority of childhood and young adult milestones, we see time differently.  We wish to stop it and treasure life more rather than rushing through it.  We gain patience and wisdom, but lose time.  It’s been two years since I last saw my two running companions from this morning, but it doesn’t feel like two years. The only tangible sign to me that two years have passed are our kids, who have grown and changed a lot in that short time.  It will probably be two years before I see them again after this trip is over, but I will carry the simplicity of what I learned from our trail journey together this morning with me throughout the upcoming year. 

Our run today started out like any New Year really, with a bit of apprehension…will my body fail me today and not be able to make the full journey without complications that might possibly slow my friends down and affect their expected run as well? Every year comes with its challenges and changes and when these happen, we wonder how we will weather it and usually, we get through it unscathed, despite our apprehensions.  This was true of today as well because after we got moving on the trail, I realized how doable it was for me, and I found my rhythm and began enjoying the new challenge running on a rocky mountain terrain brings.  Then, as we got deeper into the woods, we had to slow and move carefully to avoid being tripped up by tree roots and leaf camouflaged protruding rocks.  At first, I was proud of my footballesque maneuvers to bounce over and around these obstacles until I had a couple of near misses, which made me stop and proceed with more caution.  So, the same is true of a New Year as well, with initial apprehension turning to real and unexpected trouble because just as we begin to gain confidence moving into the year unchallenged, life jumps up at us like the sideways, jagged rocks hidden underneath the pile of leaves at our feet.  In the end, we do the best we can to deal with the curve balls life throws at us, even though we may turn our ankles like a kid on ice skates for the first time when we hit that hidden bump on life’s trail. 

Life, like running, can also become very wearying at times, and today, as 1 mile turned into 3, my body began to rebel a little bit at the use of muscles normally only reserved for hiking a few times a year, but once again, I found the wisdom in the ache. Trudging forward, despite the growing soreness in my legs, I found myself in the middle of our 3-person running group, and it was very comforting to know I had a very skilled and understanding trail leader in front of me who always made sure no one was left behind too far and a kind and empathetic friend behind me who made sure I didn’t miss any of the beautiful scenic views along the way while keeping me motivated to continue no matter what pace we maintained.  And in this part of the trail run was the most meaningful of my reflections, in my humble opinion….No matter what the year brings, God will be there leading the way through His many skilled and understanding children, and He’ll go above and beyond (if you let Him) to make life even sweeter with friends and family who take the journey with you and get you through the tough spots by simply “having your back.”  And when the run’s over, and you’ve made it through another year’s journey despite the sleet, cold, and the hazardous roots and rocks, all that is left is to enjoy a hot meal and reflect on what is and what will be as we complete another year.  Happy 2017, Ya’ll! I hope this year’s trail run through life brings you as much joy and beauty as it does growth and insight! The trail may not always be easy, but it’s so very worth the occasional pain and hunger it takes to get through it!

November 30, 2016 Finding Thankfulness in “Life as is…”

You know how stores will sell products that are damaged in some way at a discounted price? At first glance, you may not see anything wrong with item, but the low price attracts you to it.  Upon closer inspection, you notice the sticker that says, “For Sale AS IS,” which generally means something is “wrong” with it.  It may be a minor defeat, such as uneven stitching in a pair of pants that did not pass quality inspection at the factory, or something major, like a missing part that causes the product not to function as it was intended, but it is still usable in some aspect, especially for the inexpensive price. I have purchased items “as is” before, and I have passed up others that I felt were not worth the discount due to the defect; however, when it comes to life, we often have no choice but to take it “as is.” 

     We are currently living in a very unsettled and divided society, often fueled by fear and a certain controlled chaos, but we don’t have to allow this to unsettle us personally and spiritually.  I, and I believe many others, have been a bit shocked at how personally the recent presidential elections have affected those from both parties.  In my opinion, neither candidate was an ideal choice. For either one or even a third party option, we are taking them “as is” and hoping for the best.  I guess I was surprised though by how many seem to be truly in fear of where the president elect will lead our country. It has become so “doom and gloom.” 

     I often write about fear in this blog, making the point of stressing to others that we should not live in fear. I blog about this, not because I am so good at keeping my own fears at bay, but because I have struggled with fear and control issues, and from many of these issues, God has set me free, one by one, but recently I realized I had begun to live in fear again.  This time, it’s a different issue, more a fear of commitment to my job, a new church, and my continuing walk with God.  For the first 2 years after moving to WA, I was steadily looking and applying for positions elsewhere, mostly overseas. The transition from overseas back to stateside life was tough. (That’s why I stayed there 17 years and was still very afraid to move back, even when we did.) I was unsettled. I was afraid that I had made the wrong choice and drug my patient husband and son with me. I have finally stopped trying to leave, but I have still not fully committed myself to the community here either.  It’s become a bit of an introverted, debilitating fear for me. For example, I’ll attend church, but quickly slip out before I have to talk to anyone. Or I’ll go to the local and on base road races, but I am still hesitant to join one of the running groups I made a New Year’s resolution last year to join.  I’ll put myself out there, but not commit to anything long-term or that requires me to be accountable to anyone. 

     So, even though I still have some of my own fears to overcome as 2017 approaches, I am thankful for my “life as is.”  I’m hoping that by sharing my fears, “the truth will set me free,” so to speak.  Sometimes just saying what your fears are out loud take the scare factor out of them. Let’s just say it then. We’ll all a bit scared of where the country is headed, no matter who is in charge, right?! We’ll all a bit scared to make major changes in our lives to new and unfamiliar places with new and unfamiliar people and unknown experiences.  What now? Well, I’m not in control. You’re not in control. Not even President elect Trump is in control.  God is in control, and that means, I surrender my fears to Him, let go of my control issues (because I can’t control everything anyway), and take life “as is,” believing that God knows what is best and will provide as long as we trust and obey. I know, to many of you, that probably sounds like blind faith that you simply can’t put your trust in, but in these unsettled and chaotic times, would you rather live in “doom and gloom” or try out a little faith in things unseen.  After all, with God on my side, what can mere mortals do to me! J 

When hard pressed, I cried to the Lord;

    he brought me into a spacious place.

The Lord is with me; I will not be afraid.

    What can mere mortals do to me?

The Lord is with me; he is my helper.

    I look in triumph on my enemies.

It is better to take refuge in the Lord

    than to trust in humans.

It is better to take refuge in the Lord

    than to trust in princes.

Psalm 118: 5-9

October 30, 2016 Reflections from Running on Canine Power

     Why is it that I can only get stronger and better in my running ability when I am careening downhill with my dog as my pacer? That’s the thought that came into my head after my 5-mile race with Gunner last weekend when my run times were better than normal, and I didn’t even really notice the hills that I had to walk up back last June for another race on the same 5-mile stretch of rolling payment.  As I pondered this during one of our daily walks around the neighborhood, I realized that the reason I asked this question of myself is because I don’t like needing his help to get better. I want to be stubborn and get better all on my own.  Isn’t that the way of the world these days, well, at least, the American world? We are all so independent and often too prideful to ask for help.  We hear it as young as toddlers in our centers, “I can do it by myself!” they call out in frustration when the adults try to step in and help.  I can recall more than one friend, family member, and even co-worker who almost get offended when someone tries to help or they take it that they weren’t doing what they were supposed to do in the first place, just because you are helping them.

     We want to feel like we have it all under control, our control, right? Even with my dog, I realize that I am never fully in control. Yes, he minds my commands, most of the time, but there’s always the risk that he’s going to see a rabbit dart into the woods ahead of us and take off after it, dragging me along with him. He knows I will pull him back, but he can’t resist the temptation to chase that rabbit EVERY time.  Just like I can’t run a 10-minute mile every time without his help.  And you know what I decided? That’s okay.  It’s okay to need his help. It’s okay to ask for help when I need it.  In fact, in other cultures (such as the Marshallese culture), it’s a given that you won’t do anything by yourself.  From birth to death, someone is always with you.  Pregnant women are not allowed to be by themselves during the pregnancy, and when someone dies, family members sit with the body (often for weeks while they wait for funeral arrangements to be finalized) 24 hours a day until it’s time to lay them to rest in a cemetery. And the in between parts of life, Marshallese rely on family for support, for income, for help with the elderly and the children and well, for everything, really.   

     What running on canine power has taught me is that doing everything or even most things, without help, is overrated.  Whether it’s help running, help at work, help with the dishes, or help with a problem I’m struggling with, we all need someone to help us at times, maybe more times that not.  I know I couldn’t take care of all the bills and our home without my husband.  I know I couldn’t keep up with all the laundry and housecleaning without my family’s help.  I couldn’t teach my English class without my students and the support of the staff at the college.  I couldn’t manage the before school program without all the teachers and staff who show up early with me every day.  So, why do I think I should be able to be a better employee, wife, mother, daughter, and believer without help? 

     Where does my help come from? It comes to me through many different people and in many different ways, but God is in it all.  Lately, I understand that more and more, that I cannot do this life without help from God.  What does that look like, living with God’s help on a daily basis? I’m still figuring that out. How do I give up my own control issues and surrender to His? I’m still pushing back on that out too.  I have done it once before, let Him take over, but it was in a time of great stress in my life, so it felt easy because I was already so tired and had no choice but to ask for help. Now, I realize I have taken responsibility for everyone and everything in my life too much upon my own shoulders again, and even though there’s not so much stress as before, I still need His help to grow and move forward in this life.  I let myself fall back into old habits of relying on my own knowledge, strength, and experience that I left God behind, waiting for me.  It’s time to step back and let God lead again.  The ride is so much smoother when He’s in the driver’s seat, when He’s my pacer.  So, thank you, Gunner, for teaching me how to slow down and ask for help from God. Even though I know you were simply busy trying to win the race and catch that rabbit, you taught me that running on canine power means winning the race as a team with God leading the pack.    

I lift up my eyes to the mountains—

    where does my help come from?

My help comes from the Lord,

    the Maker of heaven and earth. 

He will not let your foot slip—

    he who watches over you will not slumber;

indeed, he who watches over Israel

    will neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord watches over you—

    the Lord is your shade at your right hand;

the sun will not harm you by day,

    nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep you from all harm—

    he will watch over your life;

the Lord will watch over your coming and going

    both now and forevermore.

Psalm 121

September 30, 2016 Pining for Purpose and Discovering Peace

If you have been following my blog recently, you may have noticed that since moving back to the states, I’ve been doing a lot of pining for purpose in my life. That feeling of there being something missing, something I was supposed to be doing with my life, but hadn’t yet kept nagging at me. Then, last month, an opportunity come up to volunteer (with a paid stipend) to do something I almost couldn’t resist, work with kindergarteners to achieve the goal of reading by the end of the school year.  Oh, my heart ached when it was offered to me…this is right up my alley, but the timing was not.  I couldn’t take this opportunity without hanging onto my job part time on base too, which might have worked out except that I would be working a 12 hour day 5 days a week for the next 10 months.  Besides for it being an opportunity I would have enjoyed immensely (and very similar to what I was doing for a year when I worked with the Kindergarten class as an ELL instructor on Kwajalein), it might have opened more doors for me to get back into a teaching career, which I sorely miss.  So, I prayed about it, A LOT! The more I prayed, the more I became unsettled about taking the position.  I knew I wasn’t in the right place in my life to do something like this.  I turned down the offer and instead of going back to pining for purpose again, I was surprised to discover a new feeling of peace about it all…peace in my purpose being for my family right now, peace in knowing that it’s OK for my purpose to be my children and my husband in this time and place. 

I honestly started to feel a little guilty after I realized how much I had been impatient and striving for purpose outside of the place I am in my life at this moment. I felt guilty for not thinking about how neglectful and selfish a choice this would have been, and it reminded me of the time God whispered to my mom and told her something very similar. I don’t even remember the situation exactly, but she was praying for guidance (maybe it was about moving to the beach, which she did later for several years), and she was told that there would be a time for her later, but that now it was time to take care of her daughter (me). I’m so glad she listened! You would think with a teenager, just as my boys are today, that your parenting responsibilities would lessen, and you could take on extra, but I needed my mom more as a teenager and young woman and wife than I ever had as a child. I believe my boys need me more now as well.  I want to not just be there for them, but to really be present in every way.  There are so many things I still want to teach them, so many things I want to provide guidance in, and now’s the time, before they are grown. Now it seems so clear where it was so cloudy before.  For the time being, my purpose is to take care of my family.  All the other stuff can wait. 

I think a lot of my pining for purpose here came out of the transition from life on Kwajalein to life back in America. It’s been an enlightening change from island life to stateside living. There, I really was able to do it all. On an island where everyone has an hour-long lunch at home daily and where the beach as well as your workplace is a short bike ride away, you had the ability to do more.  The saying there is that you can work a full day, then head out on an afternoon dive, and end the day with 9 holes at the golf course.  And, it’s true! You can. So, I was able to work a full day, help my boys with homework after school, attend their sporting events, run to the post office AND store, head home for a bit, then head to Cub Scouts and lead a meeting, then home again for dinner, dishes, and a little quality time with my husband before bed.  Here, I commute an hour a day, going to the grocery store takes an hour to an hour and a ½, dropping off and picking up my kids from sports practice takes another 30-45 minutes or more, and then there’s dinner, dishes, and getting prepared for the next day.  There’s still quality time with family and exercise time with the dog that usually gets worked in, but if I were to extend my workday on top of the commute and everything else, that means something would have to go.  It’s not worth sacrificing my family for it. 

What I have learned through all this is that living in the states means living a purposeful life in a different way than what I was used to before.  That said, I have definitely learned to appreciate what living overseas on a small island means, which is more time for everything as well as more opportunity to help in simple but very important ways, such as teaching English to local teachers and students or providing healthy snacks and books for children to enjoy and take home to places where they have neither most of the time.  Because there are so many basic needs in a third world country, you can often just ask what you can do to help and be overwhelmed with your choices.  You can exercise your creativity and come up with and implement your own plan to help and something about knowing you made a difference from start to finish in someone else’s life is very fulfilling.  In the states, I believe you can still make those same differences, and the same needs are there for portions of the population, but you are often searching for the organization that provides the volunteer opportunities you seek, and you are simply one of a number of people helping in very specific and limited ways laid out by the organization.  You do not always get the direct involvement in making the difference and actually seeing the change too. Instead, you may be only delivering books to offices who serve low income families who don’t have a lot of access to books OR it may be stepping into an after school program homework club and helping with homework when there’s only one teacher and 12 students to assist, but there is still purpose in it.  I see that now.

Funny thing is, after all this pining for purpose and impatience at not finding it, God gives me a little blessing, just because that’s how he is. Within a few weeks of coming to this revelation and giving up my pining, I got a call to teach an ENGL 101 class as an adjunct faculty member at a technical college I had applied to a few months back, and it happened to fit right with my current workday schedule! The college itself is only a 10-minute drive from base, so I pop out for a hour each day to teach, then head back to work.  I feel like I have been rewarded for choosing wisely because the purpose I was missing is in this new classroom with my new students! I am so excited to be teaching again.  You want to know the best part? Of course you do! I wouldn’t have been able to take this teaching job if I had taken the other volunteer opportunity, so once again, God knew what was best and what I needed. Thankfully, I followed his lead this time, although my impatience almost led me outside his guidance. Now, I am honored enough to have both, time to serve my family’s needs as well as fulfill my need for purpose again through teaching English to students who are in the midst of reinventing their lives and finding new purpose after hardships or are trying to get a running start on college and their future.