I’m running again.
{Remember? I invited you to come along. The offer is still open…}
My self-imposed training schedule looks like a list maker’s dream. Minutes ran, check-offs, dates and little boxes filled in with an I-DID-IT pencil mark.
But Fridays for me equal fun days. On Fridays I’m giving myself a bit of grace from my minute by minute, half-mile by mile schedule I run on weekends and early during my weeks.
On Fridays I jog through the hill trails near my house. I jog until I can’t do it anymore. Then I pause, wheeze uncontrollably and then allow myself the grace to walk.
To take a breath.
It’s interesting to think that just a year ago I ran up the same hills I’m now “hiking” up, hands on hips, eyes squinted toward the sun. And when I’ve caught my breath, when my lungs feel as if they can take in oxygen again, I pick my feet up again and jog again.
It’s an insane way to approach it but it works.
I wind through the rain-eroded paths and between the rocks and bushes that make up a Southern California wilderness. To the north, the mountains are still white with the snow that hasn’t melted. To the south I can’t see the ocean through the haze but it’s there. I have to stop again because the hill ahead of me coupled with the hill I’ve just clambered up are just
too
big
for me right now. In my current shape. I have to take a break.
There is nothing “fun day” about this hill, I tell myself.
At the very top of the tallest “peak” someone has thought it fitting to build a bench so I sit just for a minute where I begin to feel like an old lady. Thirty-six is definitely “late thirties”, I think. Someone just bring a crocheted blanket to wrap around my shoulders while I take a nap.
My pause can’t last forever because it’s only that. A pause.
I still have a goal which has not changed: I have to make it back to the parking lot. I have to. If not, I’ll just sit out here on this bench until the sun sets and the sky darkens. All the dog-walkers and high school track teams will have gone home to dinner.
And I will still be here.
If I don’t finish I’ll still be here in the middle of my pause.
So I take my breath, my pause, and use it for energy. Before the sun edges any further into the day I jog down the hill and all the way back to my car.
Earlier this month I took a pause. I paused my writing, my thinking, my treadmill of submitting a new post every single day for your approval. And in my small world it was a gamble.
I needed to take a break. And in that, I only guessed at what might happen. The grace I allowed myself served to give me strength. I breathed in new ideas and change, and I exhaled some new life into my own writing. And into my soul.
So you, today, take a pause in something you might need to allow grace to seep into. Stop telling yourself that if you don’t do ____________ at the same rate and intensity that you think you should then something bad will happen. Stop telling yourself that if you don’t accomplish the laundry/the emails/the pile of papers by the phone then your head will explode. Stop telling yourself that if your child is not in dance AND gymnastics AND karate AND soccer then she won’t succeed in life. Stop telling yourself that you can’t stop running.
Take a pause. And a breath.
Sit on a bench if you have to and inhale the breeze.
Allow grace to invade.
Have you been running hard lately? What helps you slow down and remember what is important?
This has SOOO been my life. With 9 kids, 2 businesses and a home to run, a ministry that God keeps in front of me, it is so hard not to think about all the things that need to be done just to keep the boat afloat.
God so graciously allowed ALLLLLL of us to get sick at the same time
. And what happened? NOTHING….the laundry is still sitting here from Monday, the sink is exploding from dishes just dropped there and God keeps showing me that it really doesn’t matter…the ‘stuff’.
I can stop and the world won’t. My kids are watching more TV than they have in a year, but for now…its ok…..
His Grace…I have to call on it all day just to keep me on the sofa
Thanks for sharing today, for me to know I am not alone and it’s ok (not that I needed your ok, I got HIS!!!!)
gonna have to admit i got stuck 8 words in at NINE KIDS. that’s both amazing and beautiful.
and yes, give yourself some grace and some pause. no doubt you need it. =)
Sarah, I commend you so for the discipline you encountered to begin jogging! My whole life people have said to me “When are you ever going to slow down?” Realizing I LOVE to journal my prayers is what I do to slow down. Every New Year I start a new journal.
that’s wonderful carol. what a good discipline to have.
Breathing, it is vital, without it we cannot live..and yet…we live our life holding our breath…slowly the oxygen that we’ve deplete ourselves of beckons us to stop and allow it to feed us.
This is where I am…
…heaving in giant gulps of air because I’ve spent so much time not breathing…
Thank God for grace and timely reminders like yours Sarah.
heave in the oxygen girl.
read a book.
take a nap.
maybe i’m talking to myself…
I love that you are running Sarah
I love to run…in fact, it is hard for me to stop… thank you for the amazing post today- i need to take a breather,a pause and just let God speak to me in life and in my runs 
mmm. i find that when i used to run a lot (a little i’ve been doing lately) god always spoke to me on my runs.
I’ve just recently discovered your blog, but I am loving your thoughts on just about everything. I think women in general are guilty of believing we can be ALL things: the wife, the supermom, the corporate woman, the housekeeper, the brilliant writer, the next jillian michaels…it’s exhausting.
I am learning to take a breath and pause to survey the projects in my life and realize what brings me joy and fulfillment and what needs to be cut out. I’ve also decided I want to run my first marathon this year (I’m allergic to running, ha!) so your stories of jogging up hills are encouraging for a girl who will soon be crawling up her first few hills. Thanks for this reminder this morning!
oh yay! keep running. wanna join our team?
/ Thank you to our Father God for giving us antoher healthy and beautiful grandchild. We are looking forward to many wonderful times together. We are so very blessed to know that all our grandchildren are being taught of the Lord and taught lovingly. Though we are very far apart and can’t see each other often like we would hope, God gives grace and comfort and keeps us close through His Holy Spirit.It is beautiful to see you two with your new daughter and to see the love in your eyes for her and for each other. We will faithfully pray for her, Evan and you all.
Thank you for the reminder! I am taking a very DEEP Breath today!
Good. let me know how it feels… =)
Beautiful insight, Sarah. Love your thoughts, here. They are rich and timeless for life runners like me. Thanks.
life runners. sigh. i’m one too. thank you Lisa
Sarah,
Thanks so much for sharing this today. It has been something Father has been working on in my own life this past two weeks. Learning how to breath, and be in the moment, and not put so many expectations on myself. Oh what a hard lesson to learn. Thank you for the beautiful way you allowed God to speak through you to me.
thank you Amber.
I understand what you are saying and I see the good in it. However, I’ll admit that I am telling myself that it is not applicable to me, at least in one area in my life. I am wrapping up my Master’s degree and need to finish my thesis paper by March 30. March 30 is approx 9 weeks away! and I have so much to do!
How can I give myself “breathing moments” when the deadline approaches quickly? And to be honest, I often give myself too much slack time, in my opinion. So in-between my slack time and the need to write, lately I fill inundated with stress. My mantra has been “this too shall pass…this is just a season.”
However, I imagine what would help is in my slack time if I turned off the internet or TV and opened myself to God, to be refreshed and refilled. Yes, that sounds like the breath of grace that I could use!
sounds like you figured it out yourself.
i agree, there are times that intensity is needed to accomplish something. i think (not the masters) that some of us take on too much that is unnecessary. i wanted to be able to shrug off what is not needed and allow grace to come in.
good luck on your masters. YOU CAN DO IT!!!
December 19th in the Jesus Calling devotional is WONDERFUL!!! I SO was feeling overwhelmed with my TO-DO list
It said, “Do not be weighed down by the clutter in your life; lots of little chores to do sometime, in no particular order….they are endless.” It painted a beautiful and much needed picture for me to quit DOing so much and BEing still in my Heavenly Father. 
I love the running picture
I did my first half marathon last year and finished the year doing 3 with 2 for Feb 2011…it has been a special time just me and God pushing me in ways I never imagined. 
that’s wonderful Teresa! congratulations. and i love what you said about life clutter. sometimes that describes me so well…
This reminds me so much of how I was feeling this past summer and fall. Feeling like I needed to regroup and slow down. To pause and take it in. For my sanity and my faith I did pause. It changed a lot for us. God changed me and is still changing me. There is such grace when we pause, when we breathe. Thanks for sharing your words with us.
I wrote about something so similar just yesterday. God must be moving on His peoples hearts toward grace. These pauses are absolutely necessary. Thank you for an encouraging post!
Beautiful Sarah – thank you for your words, not just on this post, but on your whole blog. They speak deeply in my soul.
this is exactly what i needed to hear today. i was reading this with the thought that i need to push myself to work out tonight. realistically, tonight would have been the wrong night to push that. instead, i am going to push finishing up some chores and pushing for quiet, relaxing time that my mind and body need. I’ll need prayer to do this… thanks for this very timely post.
What helps me is you.
Your posts help me stop and look at what’s important. I may sound like a broken record, but the looking for joy time last month . . .that really helped me, Sarah. God bless you and your time with Him.
Great post. Spoke to my heart.