August 2, 2012 - The Sleeping Giant

My girls and I were looking through old movies the other night and I found my case for Pearl Harbor. I love the story, even if it is fiction. It's a movie of sacrifice and commitment. Anyway...I remembered a specific line from the movie that I want to share this morning. If you have seen it, remember after the harbor was bombed the Japanese were celebrating and the commanding officer turned and looked at his leaders and said, "I fear we have only awakened a sleeping giant." Yikes! Here's what I want us to keep in the center of our choices today - while eating 2 cookies, or a McDonald's hamburger, or a candy bar may not show up too terribly on tomorrow morning's weigh in, the greater picture is the awakening the "sleeping giants" of heart disease and diabetes and other weight-related issues (I could make a list.....) These are not possibilities - these are definite issues that bad food and living choices awaken. And no one forces us to make those choices. BUT......we CAN choose the correct refueling items and leave those food-induced diseases sleeping. Just because my family struggles with cholesterol issues, doesn't mean I will. My family lived for the next gathering and eating ritual of seeing who could "out cook" the other. The more decadent the better - the more unhealthy the better! We would laugh and pat each other's bellies after stuffing ourselves and make jokes about how fat we were. (all while our children watched) And yes, I awakened "sleeping giants" and found diabetes, arthritis, reflux, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure had "bombed" my life and were destroying me. BUT GOD whose spirit is bigger than any "sleeping" giant gave me the courage to fight back. Today, the sleeping giants are dead in my life. Loosing weight and keeping it off - choosing to eat right DAILY - keeps these sleeping giants SLEEPING. We are bodies of flesh and these enemies lurk and wait......come on fam, let's choose health and keep these giants from stealing our lives. We CAN win! But, we can't be asleep and look the other way while eating that doughnut and not expect these giants to position themselves for destruction. They will bomb our harbor. Choose well and eat to live, PK