Longest 10 Seconds Ever

"Dear God,
This is the longest 10 seconds EVER...please speed up time! Please make it stop! And could I look any more ridiculous? H...E...L...P...!"

I recently had a very humbling experience. If you've been keeping up then you know that I recently injured my knee (doing nothing but standing in my kitchen while hosting my first bible study meeting) and have been recovering from surgery. I've also been going to Physical Therapy for the past 6 weeks. It has been going well and I was able to ditch the crutches about 3 weeks in. Since then we've been really focusing on strengthening not just my knee, but my entire core and getting back to my normal gait (that's the PT smarty-pants way of saying "walk").

So back to my humbling experience...my therapist had me lie down on one of the tables, on my back, bend my right leg (that's the GOOD one mind you), raise and straighten my left leg, and then using the right bent leg, lift my butt up off the table and hold for 10 seconds...I could NOT do it! I mean I sort of did it, but I couldn't lift all the way up so that my body was in a straight incline. And it had nothing to do with my knee.  I just flat out wasn't strong enough to do it.  It was so humiliating. I was trying my best and my entire body was trembling as he counted to 10 in what I swear was 3x's that of a real second. When he finally let me drop down I thought for sure he was going to say,

"OK, you're not ready for that...let's try this instead." But NO! Instead he said, "OK let's try your left leg now."

WHAAAAT?! I thought. That was my good leg and now you want me to try it on my bad one? But not wanting to be a big baby I attempted it.

"ONE.......TWO.......THREE.......FOUR.......(Insert above prayer right about here).......TEN!

So humiliating! It became quite evident to me and my physical therapist that I have never actually used those muscles before - the glutes - yeah that's the butt muscles for those of you that aren't as fitness-minded as me (ha)! So anyway, he didn't make me do anymore of them.  He was probably worried that I would pass out right there on the table in front of all his other clients...not real good for business.  He instructed me to continue working on that in my home program (yeah - I'll get right on that!).

You see, I HATE to exercise. I've been successfully avoiding it my entire life with my justifying self-talk:  It's just not my thing...There's sweating involved...I'm not that coordinated...I lack the discipline to make it a habit, so what's the point...I don't look good in work out clothes...My motto is "never run unless being chased..."

But I have a confession to make. At the beginning of 2011 I prayed a prayer asking God to help me lose 40 lbs by the time I turned 40. In my head I named this my 40x40 prayer. I prayed for it, more than once actually, and then I did nothing about it. This is a confession because I never told anybody about my 40x40 prayer. Probably because if I had, I would have had to actually do something about it. And let's face it...I really didn't want to put forth the effort. I know I'm never going to look like a SI swimsuit model, so why bother?  By not telling anyone, there was no one to hold me accountable. But guess what?...I told God and He's holding me accountable.  Here's what He's been saying to me:

Kim, it's time to wake up.  If somebody was in fact chasing you, you wouldn't have a snowball's chance of outrunning them, even before you hurt your knee. And you know what else...you don't look good in workout clothes because you never workout! And another thing...you don't hate to exercise, you've never even given it a chance.  You've just been believing the devil for most of your life that you will never be physically fit.  It's time to stop listening to those lies and start believing me!

Well when it comes to excercising I've been really good at ignoring Him.  He's been whispering to me for a long time.  I think that's why I prayed 40x40 in the first place.  But the louder He spoke the more I closed my ears until "SNAP!" (that was my knee) I could no longer ignore Him.  Not if I wanted to walk normally again anyway.

Have you ever seen the movie Evan Almighty? (click here to see the clip) It's really cute. Anyway, in it Morgan Freeman plays God and he's talking to Evan's wife (she doesn't know that he's God) and he says:

"Let me ask you something.  If someone prays for patience, do you think God gives them patience or does he give them the opportunity to be patient?  If they pray for courage, does God give them courage or the opportunity to be courageous?  If someone prayed for their family to be closer (which she did), do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them the opportunity to love each other?"

If someone prays to lose 40x40, do you think He zaps them with immediate weight loss, or does He give them the opportunity to work out?  Or in my case "force" them to start working out!  See, He really did answer my prayer.  Not the way that I wanted - SHOCKER!  But the only way He could get my attention.  He allowed my freak knee accident to occur.  Which in hindsight really isn't freaky at all.

It's no coincidence that I hurt my knee doing absolutely nothing.  Now there's no logical explantion.  Nothing I can blame it on other than myself.  It's not like I was skiing and can just decide I'm not going to ski anymore.  I can't just decide that I'm never going to stand in my kitchen again.  And it's no coincidence that it happened the day after my 40th birthday party, a week before my actual birthday, DURING my first bible study group get-together. Because of these circumstances surrounding the accident I will forever associate my injury with my 40x40 prayer.

Please don't misunderstand. I don't think God is punishing me. I think He is loving me! Loving me by revealing the lies that I've been believing all these years. Loving me by changing my heart and my mind about the importance of exercise and being healthy.   I now believe that the accident is actually the answer to my prayer (be careful what you wish for right!). 

Much to my surprise, I actually look forward to going to PT because I actually feel stronger after every session.  It doesn't matter that when I leave I haven't lost a pound. What matters is that I am getting stronger. I am amazed at how quickly my body responds when I consistently put forth a little effort.  My knee feels better. I feel better. This is a feeling I want to chase for the rest of my life, and with the focus being shifted from that of weight loss to actually feeling strong, I think I finally have the motivation to do it.

The following verse has taken on a whole new meaning for me:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses [my new bible study friends] to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down [literally], especially the sin that so easily trips us up [and lays us flat on our kitchen floor]. And let us run with endurance [remember my old motto towards running] the race God has set before us. Hebrews 12:11 (NLT)

God wants to answer my prayer because He wants me to be healthy so that I can run the race that He's set before me. I'm going to continue down this path.  It's not too late.  I've still got 9 months to be 40.  And even if I'm not 40 lbs lighter I'll probably be 40x's stronger!  It's no longer a quest to be skinny (which obviously was not a very motivating factor since I'd already deemed it impossible), but a quest to be healthy...whatever that looks like!  Thank you God for convicting me!