I was very interested to hear the responses when our Sunday School teacher asked the class what our hopes and dreams were for the New Year.
Because we have a tight-knit group, the answers sounded pretty honest. Let’s face it: we have to feel safe enough not to fear getting shot down, which, of course, is the fate of most of our dreams.
After a couple of kids and the responsibilities of life settling in, we don’t even need any outside help. When it comes to our dreams for increased health and wellness, we do a pretty good job of giving up on ourselves before we even get started.
This is why I want to share with you what happened with one of my favorite clients.
Dream dreams
At the age of eighty-two, she had attended my Faith Vs. Weight class with her daughter. A few months later, I ran into her daughter, who excitedly told me that her mother had finally experienced some relief from chronic pain issues after losing eleven pounds on the Faith Vs. Weight plan. She lost those eleven pounds in three months after having tried to lose them for more than three years!
I’m guessing that, for an eighty-two-year-old, she doesn’t have a lightning-fast metabolism, but don’t tell her that. Her body doesn’t seem to know it either. She is just getting started.
Her daughter said, “My mother can’t wait until your class starts up again in January!”
It appears that even our health-related dreams do not have an age limit: “and your old men will dream dreams” (Acts 2:17).
Stop spinning
It doesn’t matter what age, stage, or phase of life you are in. Have you given up on your health and wellness dreams? If so, my dream is for you to reclaim your energy.
This is why I wrote my books, Faith Vs. Weight: Magnifying the Glory of God by Reclaiming Your Energy to Serve the Kingdom and Faith Vs. Weight: Daily Strength to Shine Action Guide. It’s also why I teach classes and podcast under the same name, Faith Vs. Weight.
When I teach Faith Vs. Weight classes, I am particularly attuned to see who has enough resilience to pursue her dreams and who doesn’t. As you can imagine, people who still believe they have a “hope and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11), regardless of their circumstances, are typically the ones who do the best in terms of making breakthroughs with their health.
On the other hand, as the busyness of life increases as a parent, it’s easy to find reasons to decrease our own health and wellness expectations. Yet, this does not allow any room for kingdom energy.
When it comes to your health and wellness dreams, you may have been spinning your wheels for so long that you are just plain tired. I know I had so many years of spinning that I could have qualified for the Olympic trials in figure skating.
Still, another year is going to pass us by. When the clock strikes midnight at the end of 2020, are your current resolutions going to get you any closer to your health and wellness goals, or will you still be wasting your energy spinning?
Stand still
“And Moses said to them, ‘Stand still, that I may hear what the LORD will command concerning you’” (Numbers 9:8 NKJV).
I know this sounds counterintuitive, but in order to have the resilience to pursue your health and wellness dreams, you have to stop wasting your energy spinning. Stand still to listen to what the Lord is commanding concerning you.
My favorite way to do this is to listen to the Bible on various phone apps whether I am driving my boys to soccer, folding laundry, or getting some exercise in. “So faith comes from hearing” (Romans 10:17).
In the meantime, I will continue to listen and pursue my dream of teaching others how to live healthier lives so that we will have enough energy to pursue whatever “it” is we are commanded to do in 2020.
As my eighty-two-year-old client taught me, it’s never too late to pursue God’s dreams for your life, including the ones that have to do with your health. I am quite sure she would tell you not to allow anyone else to tell you any different.
So, what is your New Year’s resolution?
