Never Underestimate the Power of Believing In Someone

My recent posts, by and large, have been mostly of the surface type. I’ve had a few deep spill my guts posts, the last few have not been that, but we all love a good healthy recipe. Today, I’m back to something a bit deeper. When I started this blog, I wanted it to grow and move organically. My hope was to avoid missing positive turns because they weren’t part of my plan but ultimately, my hope was to one day become the next Jillian Michaels. Of course, myself, not just like her but I have a deep admiration for her ability to motivate. If you’ve watched her on The Biggest Loser, it may seem as if she is merely a surface intimidator. She is raw and honest. She yells and she’s tough. But really she goes deeper, she finds out why people are in the position they are in, she finds out what has gotten them there and she effectively coaches them on changing their life’s direction. She is about the workout and diet and weight loss, but further she is about living the life you want to live. I’ve heard her say many times it’s important to be present in your own life.

I have an entrepreneurial spirit that can get me in trouble. I always have an idea and it’s often much bigger than my abilities. I recently started a conversation with a friend with ‘so I have a business idea’. Without a hesitation, she said ‘oh no’. My friends have seen me go through countless ‘ideas’ and they have been beyond supportive but they know when the rubber hits the road and we move past the initial idea, I often have trouble actually taking action.

This all seems disconnected, but stick with me, I promise I am going somewhere.

Since the fall, I have been part of a small group of young adults some of whom attend the same church that I do and some who do not. We are going through a book called Storyline – Finding Your Subplot in God’s Story by Donald Miller. We are moving through the book plotting out the positive and negative turns in our lives, and how God can redeem the negative turns, thinking about the theme of our lives, and what roles we play. Among others, the roles that I wrote down for myself included leader, athlete, and writer. Those three uniquely meld together into my goal to make fitness my life’s work. Part of last night’s meeting of our group included The What If Game? For this discussion, we went participant by participant and named a role and asked what if questions. The others in the group, uncensored, called out inciting incidents and ideas. Most of us had combinations of roles that combined to make a larger ambition. My What If was essentially what if I make fitness my life’s work? It took a bit of guts to put what seemed like wild dreams out there. The other people in our group had inspiring What Ifs as well. What if I hike the entire Appalachian Trail? What if I teach the world about sustainability? What if I use my occupational therapy background in the mission field? What if I write a book or a screenplay about the story of someone in my life with a disability? My summary is not doing our discussion justice, but I’m trying my best to give you a feel for basis of the discussion.

When it was my turn, I was amazed by the ideas and advice they offered. I was feverishly scribbling down the ideas and thoughts so I could remember later. They were so thoughtful and it was obvious we all truly wanted each other to be successful in our What If and were offering the best advice and ideas we had. One of the suggestions was that I organize our group running a half marathon together. So here I am, my next move is to draft the email to our group with the information to register for the Bird-In-Hand half marathon in September, just a stone’s throw away from where we all live, a training plan, and information on some group runs. I left our group last night and I wasn’t sure if I should laugh or cry, happy tears of course. I got home and felt invincible. I felt almost as if I could stay up all night, change the world, and be at work at 8 this morning. In the end, I did not stay up all night, but as I fell asleep my mind way racing. It was like I had motivation flowing through my veins, a brain full of ideas, and a heart pumping ambition. If you have never had that feeling of invincibility, find some passion, anything and allow yourself to get lost in it. Even if you do have to wake up tomorrow morning and bring yourself back to earth, just for today, allow your ideas and excitement to spiral out of control to the point you feel like anything is possible.

I am looking forward to documenting the group half marathon training experience and slowly incorporating the other ideas I walked away with last night.