June 19, 2012 - What's In The Mirror?

How many of you have ever been carrying something heavy and had someone come and ask to relieve the burden and you refuse to let it go??? I have! Sometimes we do that because we don't want to inconvenience someone else.....sometimes it's a balancing act and one slip means everything kisses the carpet.......or sometimes we're just so tired that someone wanting to help is a question mark. I spoke with a friend yesterday who's really tired and life continues to manifest itself in difficult trials and sometimes out of desperation we begin to proclaim, "this is my place in life - this is the best I can expect." And then in defeat, and sometimes shame, we carry those burdens and the weight of life brings despair and despair CAN LEAD to a "why bother" mentality. That's when we REACH OUT to someone in this group. We are not pack horses - we were not designed to carry heavy loads for long periods of time. Telling someone you're tired, you've been making poor food choices, you're carrying this THING and your heart is breaking is a GOOD THING. How can we pray for each other unless we know? Prayer changes things! The Bible tells us to bear one another's burdens. SO........don't feel bad when you need to ask me, or someone in our family, for some extra support or accountability or a new recipe. I am the one who often doesn't release the burden because I don't want to inconvenience someone or burden THEM. I suffered for so many years in silence and I don't want any of you to do that. I understand - I care! The torture of feeling like I was always a failure and seeing myself EATING my way to an early death with no way of stopping was a nightmare that never ended. AGAIN - we are not designed to carry that kind of stress. Stress induces a multitude of creatures whose sole purpose is to sabotage your health - you know them from my blogs over the past year: weight around your belly, poor sleep, craving for sugar, binge eating, self hate. God spoke to me last week at camp about people HATING what they see in the mirror and it breaks his heart. He reminded me that as Christians, we don't HATE anyone and yet we HATE ourselves most of the time. We can't do that - it hurts our Father. He designed, color coded, and created each of us and HE IS REALLY PROUD OF HIS WORK. SOOOO.......we need to download all the self-hate statements and shake off those negative words and look back in the mirror and confess, "I can do all things through Christ" - "I bring my yoke of obesity to Jesus, for your yoke is easy - I give up." Come on fam - give up today. Drop the burdens, drink your water, smile and realize you're starting over and it's never too late. Then remind yourself - we CAN DO THIS. You CAN live a healthy life style and never grab that extra baggage again. WE just have to look into the mirror and decide THIS PERSON was never created to carry such heavy, crazy, death-inducing stuff. Let go today - stress will hurt you long term. God orders our steps - we just walk them. Walk well today and make those right choices ONE DAY AT A TIME. I am praying for our family this day. We CAN DO THIS! PK A new recipe from Shelly: 2 sugar free angel food cakes-- found them at walmart cool whip 1 lg container mix is greek yogurt blueberries truvia almond milk 3 banannas blend in a food processor layer cake/yogurt mix/cool whip/ top with blueberries