Innocence is never having been wronged; purity is the purging and healing of wrong. Children are innocent; they do not understand the world of hurt and pain. Adults with exposure to this world are not innocent, but they can become pure. Remaining ignorant of the world around us, of the pains and aches that many never recovery from, is to live a sheltered life. An act of seclusion that goes against the nature of Christ. The challenge of accepting Jesus is this: we are invited into a world of pain, yet asked to remain pure. We cannot stay innocent from the world around us, but the weight of the world's sorrow does not have to crush our spirit. It does not have to make us bitter. We can operate in world that hurts, be hurt in this world and heal from the hurt. This is the challenge of purity.
Any sort of deep injury creates a crisis for an athlete, rec-runner or exerciser. We begin to doubt our abilities. We doubt we can heal. We long for the activity we used to do so freely, but ache from the physical barrier now in place. This fear of pain, silently whispers in the back of our minds, reminding us of how much the injury hurts, how much healthier everyone else is and how difficult our current state is. How do I know this? Do I have any grounds for making this statement? As I have had three reconstructive surgeries, numerous pulled muscles and a few torn ligaments, I feel safe enough to talk about these mindsets. The injuries I listed above? I consider these my adult life injuries. These damage your mind as much or more than your body. In addition to the afore mentioned, I also broke my arm twice in childhood. The great thing about being a child? Once your arm heals and you've been out of the cast a few weeks, you forget about what happened. It stops affecting your state of mind. On the flip side, adult injuries linger on: they haunt your dreams, keep you from doing activities you love, make you believe your goals are out of reach and that you should just give up.
That's the nature of injury; it keeps us from reaching out for what we desire. What we innocently dream of before someone, or something, breaks us. I know many people who have never broken bones, torn ligaments, had reconstructive surgery or pulled muscles, but we all understand the nature physical pain. It hurts. It is our bodies response to keep itself from further harm. This pain is a healthy thing, but an injured body is not. Our response is appropriate, but remaining broken is silly. Just as a mind that never heals from past affliction is silly. Many believe the best remedy is time. Supposedly it heals all wounds. As a multiple injury sufferer, I know the truth of this statement. It's a lie. Total garbage. Time does not heal. Time does not recover. Movement, proper alignment, stabilization and rehabilitative therapy put the body back together. Action and motion heal. Negligence does not. A compound fracture will heal as a compound fracture if left alone. In other words, if you break your arm into a U-shape, it will remain a U-shape until someone straightens out your broken bones. It has to be reset. And being reset is very, VERY, painful. This is the nature of being purified.
My body is not innocent of injury, but it is pure. The injuries of the past are no longer present as deterrents to current or future movement. I don't stop and think about my past injuries before jumping on a mountain bike for a bit of fun. I just jump on and hit the trail. I don't think about how I might fall off, break an arm, get a concussion, twist an ankle, tear a tendon or any of the former injuries I've had. This is what being healed feels like. When the body is whole it doesn't hesitate to try something new. There is no fear, beyond what fear would be normal. In a sense, I have returned to my child-like state. I don't think about the bad things that have happened to me; I don't dwell on them. I use them to make smarter choices, but they don't dictate my life. They act as a guide, not a roadblock.
Is it better to be innocent or pure? Since we all start out innocent, and end up getting hurt, I would argue its better to be pure. Not that I think we should go around and rob people of their innocence. That would make us jerks! Instead, I believe we should seek to safely guide innocence. Exposing it to the world without intentionally harming it. There's enough harming of it already. To live is to lose our innocence, but innocence lost is not game over. It's not the end, even though it may feel like it.
How should we then react to innocence lost? How do we treat someone who has been broken and bruised? Too often we treat them like their damned. As in irrevocably caught in their current state with no hope of ever being returned to their former condition. In other words, they've been bit by the undead, and its only a matter of time until they start biting others. No one wants to be damned. Yet by the same turn of events, those who fear damnation are often those who damn others. We can think of damning personalities in our favorite motion pictures. It's the person who means well, but decides it is their responsibility to keep everyone else safe, often at someone else's expense. Someone they believe is unworthy or unclean.
Jesus confronted the damners of his day, and it wasn't the unclean and unworthy he warned about being damned. It was those who had power, influence and righteous looking lives. He welcomed those who couldn't stop bleeding, those who had lost limbs, lost their minds and those who had lost their way. When Jesus spoke of damnation, it was always in light of a future position, not a current state. No one was outside of his reach. No matter how damned they felt by the surrounding religious culture. Damnation is not the focus of the Bible. Words containing damn only occur fifteen times in the King James Version of the Bible. And they were always warnings; never pronouncements. Which is odd, because followers of Jesus are often portrayed as damning villians out to set the world straight. Even though that's not even close to the mission of the church. So who is miss-portraying the teachings of Jesus?
I am.
I've got scars from many others who've claimed to be followers of Jesus, but that still does not excuse me from my actions. Too many times I have walked away from "damned souls" because of the callousness of my own heart. Too many times I have walked out in frustration at the idiocy of people's actions. The life of Jesus was not one of walking out, it was one of walking in. An art form many never consider worth mastering. Too many of us stay on the bench; we're afraid to play the game like Jesus. We're afraid of being hurt, and being hurt again. We're also afraid of being damned by our society, too afraid to follow someone who's values go against the grain of our cultures belief. I'm not talking about church culture, I'm talking about popular culture. Popular culture tells us that some people are evil. Irrevocably so. There is no hope for them and therefore its okay to dispose of them. In other words, society has disposable people, and it is right for us to get rid of them, because there is no way they can change. This is not the teaching of Jesus.
Jesus taught that people can be redeemed; they can be made pure. No matter how disposable of a life they've lived. Jesus healed people others considered disposable and damned. Like the demon-possessed man on the shores of lake Galilee. Or the Samaritan reject woman multiple men used and discarded. Or the harlot caught in someone else's bed, about to be stoned to death by a righteous mob. Or the guilty convict nailed to the cross beside him. Jesus put himself in the places people needed him most. He stood between mockers and mocked, the sick and those who made them unhealthy; He stood between killers and those they wanted to kill. Why? Because Jesus knows we have all lost our innocence, and he wants all of us to be pure.
Monday, June 24, 2013
Sunday, June 16, 2013
One Degree of Change
Two weeks after a pulled hamstring and you'd think my body would have healed. While my hamstring no longer suffers uncomfortable tightness, the rest of my body still needs help. Two weeks of compensating has put stress on my other vulnerable muscle groups, those that have suffered other acute injuries. In short, unraveling my pulled hamstring has shifted my focus from the initial injury to other parts of my body that need strengthening. The body is a complex system of balancing forces, any change, even one degree of change, effects the whole; this shift focus is part of healthy and holistic living.
My greatest struggle lies in two areas: my right knee and my left ankle. My knee has range of motion of issues. My ankle has structural issues. Healing them, requires strengthening muscles that control their movements. Let's look at my knee first.
I have an extension issue. My right leg does not straighten to the same degree as my left; I'm a few degrees short of my ideal extension. I was not born this way. ACL surgery and improper recovery made me this way. When I do Pilates, I notice the extension in my leg improves and I find it easier to hold. I don't have to concentrate as much to get my leg straight. What am I trying to say? When I don't do Pilates I have to focus and strain to get the extension my leg is capable of. I wish finding a Pilates class required little effort, but truth be told, most Pilates classes are scheduled during the 9-5 work week. To be concise, unless you have an irregular or flexible working schedule, getting into a Pilates class is going to take some serious effort. And money.
What's so great about Pilates? It was built for recovery. Literally, it's core principles were designed to help soldiers recover from battle wounds. Why isn't it used by military forces and regularly instituted in hospitals? Because it was developed in a British Internment Camp during World War I. Joseph Pilates decided he would do something to help the wounded being brought into the camp, as he was the only one who had a background in physical training. He wasn't a British saint. He was a German relocated because of his ethnicity; he was a prisoner in the camp. Not exactly the grounds for becoming a well known rehabilitative specialist. After the war he moved to New York and eventually opened a studio where he taught his signature exercises. Primarily to the athletic population of his day. Dancers.
This is why Pilates is often thought of as a class for dancers; it strengthens and lengthens muscles, while at the same time focusing on proper breathing. True Pilates isn't for the faint of heart; 10 minutes of good Pilates is tough and 60 minutes is enough to crush the desire of anyone not knowing what they are walking into. But if you know something about how the body should move, and the way you feel after a class, then you know that Pilates should be in your exercising repertoire. I alas I digress, let's turn our focus back on my ankle.
My foot has a structural problem. Was I born this way? Couldn't tell you. But I can tell you that I've been classified with a flat left foot since elementary school. If the muscles involved in knee extension are simple, then ankle movement is quite complex. There's a lot of movement going on down there, and we rarely think about it because we're constantly disconnecting ourselves from the sensations in our feet. Why? Because feet are vulnerable and full of sensation! The foot has many moving parts, and thus the capacity to feel quite numerous subtle shifts. It also forms the base of our kinetic chain. A change further up the chain will often make its way down to the ankle. For example, a right sided hamstring injury causes additional flexion in the right leg. This tension is transferred to the left hip because the left leg straightens to maintain posture and take weight off the affected leg. This additional tension in the hip causes a weight shift from the right foot to the left, and suddenly the left foot gets very tired because its doing the work of two feet! The ability to fully extend my right knee directly affects the weight on my left ankle. Is there any hope of restoration? Yes. As the body is a tensional network of forces, it directs us to the weakest areas by comparison to our other, hopefully, healthier side. As the body is not a fixed entity, it's constantly changing, we can promote healthy structural changes through exercise. Because the joints in my ankle are made up of gliding surfaces subject to the forces of the tendons and ligaments around them, I can change the structure of my foot by strengthening surrounding tissue.
What's the best way to strengthen tissue? Mobility. A moving body is a healthy body. This doesn't always mean we need to use weight, as much of popular Pilates is done with body weight and a change in planes.
What does any of this have to do with spirituality? Healthy spirituality requires movement. A spirituality that requires no action is unhealthy; its just a way of feeling good about yourself. True spirituality is holistic. It looks at an injury in light of a tensional network that makes up the body; it doesn't view one injury disconnected from the rest. True spirituality does not require additional materials; it's based on the principles of functionality found in the human form. It may use additional materials to help us understand our own form, but will not be built around a foreign concept found outside natural living.
Is Christianity really built around these principles? Check out it's additional material; The Bible (aka the book). This book is the only supplemental material basic, and yet complex, enough to articulate the natural condition of humanity. While understanding it is complex and often confusing, (like trying to figure out how to heal the sum of compensational forces) it has moments of clarity. Principles that do not require a special degree or certification to understand. But just like good exercise, it's important not to attempt reading it on our own. Why? Because we have a tendency to boil it down to less than it is or add our own thoughts and ideas to its wisdom. Which is where the church has its biggest problem; we spend too much time trying to explain its exercises than doing them ourselves. We like to add to the list of thing we need to do, making an oppressive list out of simple truth. If we were to practice the little things: like loving our neighbors, or loving ourselves, the world would be a different place.
Our world is a tensional network. It hurts, but it also heals. We have the opportunity to be a part of the healing as we learn how to be healed. It's easier than we think, yet doing it is harder than we like.
My greatest struggle lies in two areas: my right knee and my left ankle. My knee has range of motion of issues. My ankle has structural issues. Healing them, requires strengthening muscles that control their movements. Let's look at my knee first.
I have an extension issue. My right leg does not straighten to the same degree as my left; I'm a few degrees short of my ideal extension. I was not born this way. ACL surgery and improper recovery made me this way. When I do Pilates, I notice the extension in my leg improves and I find it easier to hold. I don't have to concentrate as much to get my leg straight. What am I trying to say? When I don't do Pilates I have to focus and strain to get the extension my leg is capable of. I wish finding a Pilates class required little effort, but truth be told, most Pilates classes are scheduled during the 9-5 work week. To be concise, unless you have an irregular or flexible working schedule, getting into a Pilates class is going to take some serious effort. And money.
What's so great about Pilates? It was built for recovery. Literally, it's core principles were designed to help soldiers recover from battle wounds. Why isn't it used by military forces and regularly instituted in hospitals? Because it was developed in a British Internment Camp during World War I. Joseph Pilates decided he would do something to help the wounded being brought into the camp, as he was the only one who had a background in physical training. He wasn't a British saint. He was a German relocated because of his ethnicity; he was a prisoner in the camp. Not exactly the grounds for becoming a well known rehabilitative specialist. After the war he moved to New York and eventually opened a studio where he taught his signature exercises. Primarily to the athletic population of his day. Dancers.
This is why Pilates is often thought of as a class for dancers; it strengthens and lengthens muscles, while at the same time focusing on proper breathing. True Pilates isn't for the faint of heart; 10 minutes of good Pilates is tough and 60 minutes is enough to crush the desire of anyone not knowing what they are walking into. But if you know something about how the body should move, and the way you feel after a class, then you know that Pilates should be in your exercising repertoire. I alas I digress, let's turn our focus back on my ankle.
My foot has a structural problem. Was I born this way? Couldn't tell you. But I can tell you that I've been classified with a flat left foot since elementary school. If the muscles involved in knee extension are simple, then ankle movement is quite complex. There's a lot of movement going on down there, and we rarely think about it because we're constantly disconnecting ourselves from the sensations in our feet. Why? Because feet are vulnerable and full of sensation! The foot has many moving parts, and thus the capacity to feel quite numerous subtle shifts. It also forms the base of our kinetic chain. A change further up the chain will often make its way down to the ankle. For example, a right sided hamstring injury causes additional flexion in the right leg. This tension is transferred to the left hip because the left leg straightens to maintain posture and take weight off the affected leg. This additional tension in the hip causes a weight shift from the right foot to the left, and suddenly the left foot gets very tired because its doing the work of two feet! The ability to fully extend my right knee directly affects the weight on my left ankle. Is there any hope of restoration? Yes. As the body is a tensional network of forces, it directs us to the weakest areas by comparison to our other, hopefully, healthier side. As the body is not a fixed entity, it's constantly changing, we can promote healthy structural changes through exercise. Because the joints in my ankle are made up of gliding surfaces subject to the forces of the tendons and ligaments around them, I can change the structure of my foot by strengthening surrounding tissue.
What's the best way to strengthen tissue? Mobility. A moving body is a healthy body. This doesn't always mean we need to use weight, as much of popular Pilates is done with body weight and a change in planes.
What does any of this have to do with spirituality? Healthy spirituality requires movement. A spirituality that requires no action is unhealthy; its just a way of feeling good about yourself. True spirituality is holistic. It looks at an injury in light of a tensional network that makes up the body; it doesn't view one injury disconnected from the rest. True spirituality does not require additional materials; it's based on the principles of functionality found in the human form. It may use additional materials to help us understand our own form, but will not be built around a foreign concept found outside natural living.
Is Christianity really built around these principles? Check out it's additional material; The Bible (aka the book). This book is the only supplemental material basic, and yet complex, enough to articulate the natural condition of humanity. While understanding it is complex and often confusing, (like trying to figure out how to heal the sum of compensational forces) it has moments of clarity. Principles that do not require a special degree or certification to understand. But just like good exercise, it's important not to attempt reading it on our own. Why? Because we have a tendency to boil it down to less than it is or add our own thoughts and ideas to its wisdom. Which is where the church has its biggest problem; we spend too much time trying to explain its exercises than doing them ourselves. We like to add to the list of thing we need to do, making an oppressive list out of simple truth. If we were to practice the little things: like loving our neighbors, or loving ourselves, the world would be a different place.
Our world is a tensional network. It hurts, but it also heals. We have the opportunity to be a part of the healing as we learn how to be healed. It's easier than we think, yet doing it is harder than we like.
Friday, June 14, 2013
The Art of Standing
In the week since my hamstring injury, I did a lot of Tai Chi. I also audited multiple fitness locations, ensuring their processes matched their promises. At first glance, rules about operations have little to do with fitness. However, the connection I see lies within the nature of repetitive motions; if we can repeat the motion without great difficulty and without err, then the motion should be considered Law worthy. Meaning it is capable of being reproduced by others in such a fashion that it builds health and strength. The motion I repeated quite often this week? Standing. Or to be more concise: standing upright, transitioning into a balanced movement and then returning to a stable standing position.
I practice Wu Tai Chi. Which means I constantly shift my weight from foot to foot. When I showed part of this form to a group of Chi Kung practitioners (whose movements were fixed or required little weight shifting) they said it looked like dancing. The Wu short form comprises 108 postures, but as I watch the master who's practiced it for the better part of a century, I notice that he never stops moving. There is no transitional movement. Each posture leads directly into the next with no breaks in between. The difficult part? Shifting weight from one foot to the other, balancing on one foot while moving the other, turning on weighted heels to complete kicking rotational turns, that and trying to focus on what part of the body should keep moving. Knowing what to keep moving is not always apparent, sometimes its the core muscles, not arms or legs.
Moving slowly and purposefully through the form takes focus. When I do it properly I feel like I'm floating. When I don't I feel like a baby taking it's first steps. I end up somewhere between graceful and horribly awkward. At least that's what goes through my head when I wobble back and forth! Somewhere between the graceful movement of the master and my awkward side steps to catch my balance, I discover something important; He never compromises his position. Not once. He always moves from a position of strength. As I watch to see what he's doing, I deduce that I take too big of steps. I compromise my position by the distance from one foot to the other. In short I have a stepping/standing problem; I have really long legs that like to take big steps!
As I consider this issue, I ask myself, "Why do I take such big steps?" and I ponder: "Do I practice too many warrior poses? Do I like sprinting too much? Do I feel like have to take such big steps because I'm such a tall guy?" Perhaps, but the real issue I find is not one of kinetics or the joy of a good lunge, instead it lies within my heart; I take such big steps because it makes me feel like I'm making better and bigger progress. True, large steps challenge balance and strength in a way small steps do not, but at the same time they deny the unity of movement in the form, even though the form has a few big steps. I over stride out of pride. Taking small steps requires humility. Apparently more than I readily have available at the start of each Tai Chi form.
The more I practice the form, the greater my ability to take short steps. The more I take short steps, the greater the grace I possess when I move. I can focus more easily. Patiently I wait while slowly moving my body through the poses, as one continuous whole. This is the spiritual practice of Tai Chi. Enjoyed by the many who've practiced it over it's inception thousands of years ago.
I could stop writing here, and encourage you to mediate on the desire to find a place where you can move slowly and gracefully in a world that attempts to spin itself silly, but allow me if you will, to take one more step. For this step is not out of line with the previous lines you have read, but is an interpretation of the meaning of steps. One of great value worth considering as we contemplate how to move among others. It is not enough for us to focus solely on ourselves, we must consider our movements as tandem motions with others. This separates Tai Chi from Chi Kung. Tai Chi requires a group. Chi Kung does not. Thus Tai Chi and the practice of auditing share much of the same philosophy. We examine ourselves, proposing and evaluating practices that help us move together, even though apart from each other.
As I audit, I review not only the promises my organization holds itself by, but the promises that define the core of the organization. Through these 'rules' I see the identity and the person we want to become. Some of these rules overstep themselves. They attempt to fix a problem by adding layers of regulation and motion to better define our action. Yet they fall short. As I look at the rules of my organization, I see shortcomings. I see repetitive overlap. I see a weighted grading system that is conscious of its own parts but not of the whole. The parts do not fit well together. They do not flow seamlessly with grace. Yet I audit anyway, in the hope that these parts will flow, that they can fit together, if only we take the time to study how we should move. We must simply learn how to keep from over striding; how to reign in our own pride and learn how to move with each other. The number of rules sits second to the purpose of the movement. We can achieve more by burdening ourselves with less.
Consider this statement at the dawn of believers, those who watched Christ as master, before the structures we know as Christianity came into existence:
"Then some of the believers, who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, 'The Gentiles [those coming to believe in Christ apart from Jewish religious tradition] must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses.' The apostles [the disciples who spent times with Jesus] and elders met to consider this question. After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: 'Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving them the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. He made no distinction between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of the disciples [new believers] a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear? No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.' "
In the beginning, the argument over rules reigned. The body of believers came to a conclusion:
"...It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell,"
Such a simple structure. And even so, new believers raised issues about food. And the apostles with the elders reached an agreement, while it is good to avoid these things, food is not what taints the body. Therefore if you purchase food sacrificed to idols because its the cheapest way to live, you are not doing evil; you are still a part of the body of believers. Meaning, the early church and it's believers stood on one thing: abstain... from sexual immorality. One rule.
This rule creates such difficulty! To say it only pertains to sexual relations does not fully describe the depth behind the words. This rule governs ALL relationships of the believers; for the believers should re-produce on a daily basis. God intends believers to live this way; we live as a re-productive people.
When the church forgets how to re-produce, it turns to rules and regulations. It stops re-producing out of fear and lack of control. Many churches have more rules than healthy relationships, because we still have not learned how to re-produce rightly. We still want to do it in a way that only benefits us, not a way that creates mutual benefit. We regulate to the point of death, believing it will set the world right, but this regulation only creates confusion and chaos. We forget our identity. We forget how to live. We forget our first calling, which beats at the center of the first rule of believers; Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your mind and with all your strength. Jesus aptly describes what this means: Love your neighbor as yourself! This fulfills all our supposed man-made laws, rules and regulations of all our organizations and longstanding structures. By grace we have been saved; not by our rules. Grace in the love of the LORD.
The challenge of today's believers matches that of the early believers, to be right in ALL our relationships: whether as spouses, business partners, friends, acquaintances, neighbors, co-workers, employees, employers, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, teachers, masters, group exercise instructors or personal trainers. In ALL that we do, do we bring honor to our Master? I hope to live this way, and hope to enjoy a life finding out what it means to live by the love and grace of my LORD and Master. In all that I do. It will take focus; I will have to humble myself in my own eyes, move away from the awkward motions of my erring heart and into the graceful motions of my LORD and Savior.
I practice Wu Tai Chi. Which means I constantly shift my weight from foot to foot. When I showed part of this form to a group of Chi Kung practitioners (whose movements were fixed or required little weight shifting) they said it looked like dancing. The Wu short form comprises 108 postures, but as I watch the master who's practiced it for the better part of a century, I notice that he never stops moving. There is no transitional movement. Each posture leads directly into the next with no breaks in between. The difficult part? Shifting weight from one foot to the other, balancing on one foot while moving the other, turning on weighted heels to complete kicking rotational turns, that and trying to focus on what part of the body should keep moving. Knowing what to keep moving is not always apparent, sometimes its the core muscles, not arms or legs.
Moving slowly and purposefully through the form takes focus. When I do it properly I feel like I'm floating. When I don't I feel like a baby taking it's first steps. I end up somewhere between graceful and horribly awkward. At least that's what goes through my head when I wobble back and forth! Somewhere between the graceful movement of the master and my awkward side steps to catch my balance, I discover something important; He never compromises his position. Not once. He always moves from a position of strength. As I watch to see what he's doing, I deduce that I take too big of steps. I compromise my position by the distance from one foot to the other. In short I have a stepping/standing problem; I have really long legs that like to take big steps!
As I consider this issue, I ask myself, "Why do I take such big steps?" and I ponder: "Do I practice too many warrior poses? Do I like sprinting too much? Do I feel like have to take such big steps because I'm such a tall guy?" Perhaps, but the real issue I find is not one of kinetics or the joy of a good lunge, instead it lies within my heart; I take such big steps because it makes me feel like I'm making better and bigger progress. True, large steps challenge balance and strength in a way small steps do not, but at the same time they deny the unity of movement in the form, even though the form has a few big steps. I over stride out of pride. Taking small steps requires humility. Apparently more than I readily have available at the start of each Tai Chi form.
The more I practice the form, the greater my ability to take short steps. The more I take short steps, the greater the grace I possess when I move. I can focus more easily. Patiently I wait while slowly moving my body through the poses, as one continuous whole. This is the spiritual practice of Tai Chi. Enjoyed by the many who've practiced it over it's inception thousands of years ago.
I could stop writing here, and encourage you to mediate on the desire to find a place where you can move slowly and gracefully in a world that attempts to spin itself silly, but allow me if you will, to take one more step. For this step is not out of line with the previous lines you have read, but is an interpretation of the meaning of steps. One of great value worth considering as we contemplate how to move among others. It is not enough for us to focus solely on ourselves, we must consider our movements as tandem motions with others. This separates Tai Chi from Chi Kung. Tai Chi requires a group. Chi Kung does not. Thus Tai Chi and the practice of auditing share much of the same philosophy. We examine ourselves, proposing and evaluating practices that help us move together, even though apart from each other.
As I audit, I review not only the promises my organization holds itself by, but the promises that define the core of the organization. Through these 'rules' I see the identity and the person we want to become. Some of these rules overstep themselves. They attempt to fix a problem by adding layers of regulation and motion to better define our action. Yet they fall short. As I look at the rules of my organization, I see shortcomings. I see repetitive overlap. I see a weighted grading system that is conscious of its own parts but not of the whole. The parts do not fit well together. They do not flow seamlessly with grace. Yet I audit anyway, in the hope that these parts will flow, that they can fit together, if only we take the time to study how we should move. We must simply learn how to keep from over striding; how to reign in our own pride and learn how to move with each other. The number of rules sits second to the purpose of the movement. We can achieve more by burdening ourselves with less.
Consider this statement at the dawn of believers, those who watched Christ as master, before the structures we know as Christianity came into existence:
"Then some of the believers, who belonged to the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, 'The Gentiles [those coming to believe in Christ apart from Jewish religious tradition] must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses.' The apostles [the disciples who spent times with Jesus] and elders met to consider this question. After much discussion, Peter got up and addressed them: 'Brothers, you know that some time ago God made a choice among you that the Gentiles might hear from my lips the message of the gospel and believe. God, who knows the heart, showed that he accepted them by giving them the Holy Spirit to them, just as he did to us. He made no distinction between us and them, for he purified their hearts by faith. Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of the disciples [new believers] a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear? No! We believe it is through the grace of our Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.' "
In the beginning, the argument over rules reigned. The body of believers came to a conclusion:
"...It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: You are to abstain from food sacrificed to idols, from blood, from the meat of strangled animals and from sexual immorality. You will do well to avoid these things. Farewell,"
Such a simple structure. And even so, new believers raised issues about food. And the apostles with the elders reached an agreement, while it is good to avoid these things, food is not what taints the body. Therefore if you purchase food sacrificed to idols because its the cheapest way to live, you are not doing evil; you are still a part of the body of believers. Meaning, the early church and it's believers stood on one thing: abstain... from sexual immorality. One rule.
This rule creates such difficulty! To say it only pertains to sexual relations does not fully describe the depth behind the words. This rule governs ALL relationships of the believers; for the believers should re-produce on a daily basis. God intends believers to live this way; we live as a re-productive people.
When the church forgets how to re-produce, it turns to rules and regulations. It stops re-producing out of fear and lack of control. Many churches have more rules than healthy relationships, because we still have not learned how to re-produce rightly. We still want to do it in a way that only benefits us, not a way that creates mutual benefit. We regulate to the point of death, believing it will set the world right, but this regulation only creates confusion and chaos. We forget our identity. We forget how to live. We forget our first calling, which beats at the center of the first rule of believers; Love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your mind and with all your strength. Jesus aptly describes what this means: Love your neighbor as yourself! This fulfills all our supposed man-made laws, rules and regulations of all our organizations and longstanding structures. By grace we have been saved; not by our rules. Grace in the love of the LORD.
The challenge of today's believers matches that of the early believers, to be right in ALL our relationships: whether as spouses, business partners, friends, acquaintances, neighbors, co-workers, employees, employers, brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, teachers, masters, group exercise instructors or personal trainers. In ALL that we do, do we bring honor to our Master? I hope to live this way, and hope to enjoy a life finding out what it means to live by the love and grace of my LORD and Master. In all that I do. It will take focus; I will have to humble myself in my own eyes, move away from the awkward motions of my erring heart and into the graceful motions of my LORD and Savior.
Sunday, June 9, 2013
Mending the Body
Last week we discussed the nature of injury, this week I want to focus on the restoration of the body. In order to do so we must overturn a commonly held notion of healing; the best way to heal is to do nothing. While this works when the body is healthy and is fighting off viruses, bacteria or other infections this philosophy does not apply to injuries. Healing an injury requires work. Which is the nature of this week's topic.
Before we examine how to treat an injury, the kind of work we need to do, we must take a look at the commonly held notion of doing nothing as a way of recuperation. I am all for a day of rest, a day we relax, take a break and enjoy the simple pleasures of life. This is different from consistently doing nothing, hoping an injury will get better. What happens when we do nothing, is exactly that. Nothing happens. Or to be more accurate, the body atrophies. Atrophy is a weakening of our muscles. In the case of muscles tightness, atrophy appears to release the pain, but what actually happens is the injury remains but is no longer felt. When we return to movement, the pain returns. Time does not heal all wounds, active recovery and motion will.
What's the atrophy window? 48 hours. We have 48 hours to subject our body to some kind of motion and physical exercise to continue building strength. Now say we immobilize part of the body. As in we no longer let it move the way it normally does. We impede its function. When we do this, atrophy occurs faster. I know this first hand from two broken arms, a shattered hand and two torn ACL's. In the case of my legs, one was braced for support while the other was allowed to move freely. If you were to examine my legs today, you may not be able to tell which one was braced and which one was allowed to move freely. Yet, when I do heavy leg exercises, I can still feel the difference. I favor the side that was braced; it's the weaker of the two. Even though its my 'strong leg' not my 'skill leg'. Had my 'strong leg' not been immediately braced, but allowed to move freely in the early stages of recovery I wouldn't have this issue. It's amazing how such a simple decision has had such a powerful effect on the current state of my body. The effect is mostly negligible now, but its something I keep in mind when pushing myself in the weight room. Which brings us to the point of today's article.
When recovering from an injury, the entire body needs to be focused on, not just the injured part. When I was playing football in college, I hurt my left ankle, and faithfully trained my left leg. However, this created an imbalance between my legs, as my right side not only had to compensate for the injury, but also wasn't being trained the same way as the left. What started out as a left sided injury eventually caused a right sided injury because I solely focused on the injured side. I forgot to think about my whole body. I didn't understand that my body functioned as a unit, and the whole body needs to be addressed in recovery. I learned this the hard way, and now I apply this method to my training & recovery efforts.
What does it mean to holistically treat an injury? It means working it in tandem, through function movements and full range of motion. This means working at the speed and strength of the weakest muscles. For example, I wouldn't squat with a weight that would cause me to favor one side. I would simply have to do more reps at lower weights to maintain balance and strength. This can be frustrating, as one side is working harder than the other, but keeps the body from over-training and over-compensating while it heals. In addition to strengthening exercises, mobility exercises need to be introduced; the body needs to trained in multiple planes of movement. Multiple planes recruit stabilizing muscles to support the primary movers, causing more muscle fibers to be recruited in a specific activity. These stabilizing activities prevent future injuries and help the affected area build strength without compromising safety. If we limit our training and recovery efforts to a few planes, the muscle will not recovery as quickly, and more importantly, the stabilizers that prevent future injury will not be sufficiently strengthened to support future movement. In short, proper recovery requires introducing the affected area to multiple movements and supported strengthening exercises. An effective recovery program subjects both sides of the body to these methods, preventing imbalances.
There are natural imbalances in the body. We tend to use one side for skilled activities and the other for stabilization. We all have a dominant hand that is much better at writing than the other. But the hand we write with is not our power or strong hand. For example, I'm right handed; yet, when I box, my left hand is my power hand and my right hand is my speed hand. This truth applies to the legs. I use one foot to push off with and the other to kick with. Why the a natural imbalance? Because we do more activities with one side than the other. These are subtle differences, not major ones resulting from an injury. Injury causes one side of our body to pick up the slack from the other. In other words, the power hand is forced to be the speed hand, the skill leg is forced to be the strong leg, etc. This new stress can overload the compensating side, causing it to tire, wearing out and become injured.
What does this have to do with spiritual principles? When we hurt emotionally, we have a tendency to withdraw in on ourselves to stabilize our emotions. While this initial withdrawal is healthy, we often prolong our period of withdrawal, causing an unhealthy emotional imbalance. The act of recovery requires subtle, slow movements in an supportive environment, while at the same time introducing our spirits to strengthening activities. Too often we withdraw for a time, but don't properly let our spirit recover. As soon as we stop feeling pain, we go back to our previous activities. We tend to neglect supportive strengthening efforts, AKA stable relationships, as we strive to prove our independence. We don't spend time exploring the range of our emotions resulting from an injury, we accept anger and hate towards another person or towards a whole gender of people. Instead of comfortably working through the pain, we try to ignore it, pretending nothing ever happened. This creates emotional imbalances that can lead to further emotional injury. Just as we treat a physical injury, we should also treat an emotional one with the same training methods.
Where's the Christian approach in all of this? You would be correct to say what I have described is a good philosophy that applies to most situations. It's not uniquely Christian. To speak of a uniquely Christian perspective, would require me to talk about God, and how he helps our injured state of being. It requires me to say that God cares about our injuries, and wants us to be whole. But there's more. While I could speak about Jesus, and his many healing miracles, he's not the main form of support for Christians; the Holy Spirit is. From a technical standpoint, I could just talk about the Holy Spirit in reference to God. The Holy Spirit is God, but we recognize a difference because of the way we experience God through the Holy Spirit. Jesus is the person standing next to us; the Holy Spirit is the voice inside of us, surrounding us and moving through us. It's the still small voice that prompts our healing and the healing of others through healthy action. Christians have another name for the Holy Spirit: the Comforter. Why is the Holy Spirit considered the Comforter? Because It's not only the voice of God that calms us and reassures us of His love, but It's also the active hand of God. When we cry out, God hears us and settles His presence around us through the Holy Spirit. He does not leave us alone to lick our wounds. He seeks to be near us, support us and help us get back on our feet. We can refuse His help, just as we can refuse advice from a trainer of doctor, and He will let us walk our own path. But this is never His desire. His desire is our wholeness, which comes from not only spending time with Him, but also doing what He prompts us. Which is a topic for a later date.
Before we examine how to treat an injury, the kind of work we need to do, we must take a look at the commonly held notion of doing nothing as a way of recuperation. I am all for a day of rest, a day we relax, take a break and enjoy the simple pleasures of life. This is different from consistently doing nothing, hoping an injury will get better. What happens when we do nothing, is exactly that. Nothing happens. Or to be more accurate, the body atrophies. Atrophy is a weakening of our muscles. In the case of muscles tightness, atrophy appears to release the pain, but what actually happens is the injury remains but is no longer felt. When we return to movement, the pain returns. Time does not heal all wounds, active recovery and motion will.
What's the atrophy window? 48 hours. We have 48 hours to subject our body to some kind of motion and physical exercise to continue building strength. Now say we immobilize part of the body. As in we no longer let it move the way it normally does. We impede its function. When we do this, atrophy occurs faster. I know this first hand from two broken arms, a shattered hand and two torn ACL's. In the case of my legs, one was braced for support while the other was allowed to move freely. If you were to examine my legs today, you may not be able to tell which one was braced and which one was allowed to move freely. Yet, when I do heavy leg exercises, I can still feel the difference. I favor the side that was braced; it's the weaker of the two. Even though its my 'strong leg' not my 'skill leg'. Had my 'strong leg' not been immediately braced, but allowed to move freely in the early stages of recovery I wouldn't have this issue. It's amazing how such a simple decision has had such a powerful effect on the current state of my body. The effect is mostly negligible now, but its something I keep in mind when pushing myself in the weight room. Which brings us to the point of today's article.
When recovering from an injury, the entire body needs to be focused on, not just the injured part. When I was playing football in college, I hurt my left ankle, and faithfully trained my left leg. However, this created an imbalance between my legs, as my right side not only had to compensate for the injury, but also wasn't being trained the same way as the left. What started out as a left sided injury eventually caused a right sided injury because I solely focused on the injured side. I forgot to think about my whole body. I didn't understand that my body functioned as a unit, and the whole body needs to be addressed in recovery. I learned this the hard way, and now I apply this method to my training & recovery efforts.
What does it mean to holistically treat an injury? It means working it in tandem, through function movements and full range of motion. This means working at the speed and strength of the weakest muscles. For example, I wouldn't squat with a weight that would cause me to favor one side. I would simply have to do more reps at lower weights to maintain balance and strength. This can be frustrating, as one side is working harder than the other, but keeps the body from over-training and over-compensating while it heals. In addition to strengthening exercises, mobility exercises need to be introduced; the body needs to trained in multiple planes of movement. Multiple planes recruit stabilizing muscles to support the primary movers, causing more muscle fibers to be recruited in a specific activity. These stabilizing activities prevent future injuries and help the affected area build strength without compromising safety. If we limit our training and recovery efforts to a few planes, the muscle will not recovery as quickly, and more importantly, the stabilizers that prevent future injury will not be sufficiently strengthened to support future movement. In short, proper recovery requires introducing the affected area to multiple movements and supported strengthening exercises. An effective recovery program subjects both sides of the body to these methods, preventing imbalances.
There are natural imbalances in the body. We tend to use one side for skilled activities and the other for stabilization. We all have a dominant hand that is much better at writing than the other. But the hand we write with is not our power or strong hand. For example, I'm right handed; yet, when I box, my left hand is my power hand and my right hand is my speed hand. This truth applies to the legs. I use one foot to push off with and the other to kick with. Why the a natural imbalance? Because we do more activities with one side than the other. These are subtle differences, not major ones resulting from an injury. Injury causes one side of our body to pick up the slack from the other. In other words, the power hand is forced to be the speed hand, the skill leg is forced to be the strong leg, etc. This new stress can overload the compensating side, causing it to tire, wearing out and become injured.
What does this have to do with spiritual principles? When we hurt emotionally, we have a tendency to withdraw in on ourselves to stabilize our emotions. While this initial withdrawal is healthy, we often prolong our period of withdrawal, causing an unhealthy emotional imbalance. The act of recovery requires subtle, slow movements in an supportive environment, while at the same time introducing our spirits to strengthening activities. Too often we withdraw for a time, but don't properly let our spirit recover. As soon as we stop feeling pain, we go back to our previous activities. We tend to neglect supportive strengthening efforts, AKA stable relationships, as we strive to prove our independence. We don't spend time exploring the range of our emotions resulting from an injury, we accept anger and hate towards another person or towards a whole gender of people. Instead of comfortably working through the pain, we try to ignore it, pretending nothing ever happened. This creates emotional imbalances that can lead to further emotional injury. Just as we treat a physical injury, we should also treat an emotional one with the same training methods.
Where's the Christian approach in all of this? You would be correct to say what I have described is a good philosophy that applies to most situations. It's not uniquely Christian. To speak of a uniquely Christian perspective, would require me to talk about God, and how he helps our injured state of being. It requires me to say that God cares about our injuries, and wants us to be whole. But there's more. While I could speak about Jesus, and his many healing miracles, he's not the main form of support for Christians; the Holy Spirit is. From a technical standpoint, I could just talk about the Holy Spirit in reference to God. The Holy Spirit is God, but we recognize a difference because of the way we experience God through the Holy Spirit. Jesus is the person standing next to us; the Holy Spirit is the voice inside of us, surrounding us and moving through us. It's the still small voice that prompts our healing and the healing of others through healthy action. Christians have another name for the Holy Spirit: the Comforter. Why is the Holy Spirit considered the Comforter? Because It's not only the voice of God that calms us and reassures us of His love, but It's also the active hand of God. When we cry out, God hears us and settles His presence around us through the Holy Spirit. He does not leave us alone to lick our wounds. He seeks to be near us, support us and help us get back on our feet. We can refuse His help, just as we can refuse advice from a trainer of doctor, and He will let us walk our own path. But this is never His desire. His desire is our wholeness, which comes from not only spending time with Him, but also doing what He prompts us. Which is a topic for a later date.
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
Anatomy of Injury
Today I am going to proceed without Scripture, not because it is incapable of breaching the subject, but because I am incapable of bringing to bear what a specific Scripture and context say about it. Or, to cite the Scriptures that dig deep enough into the subject would require too much space. So in lieu of starting with Scripture I will cite narratives within the Bible as they pertain to the picture as a whole. Without any further ado, let us begin!
Injury. It may be a pulled hamstring or a broken heart, but all injuries fall into two categories: acute or chronic. An acute injury is something that has never happened before. It may come suddenly in an accident, or there may be a period of wearing down until finally something tears. In the case of a chronic injury, an acute injury has already taken place, but it has either not healed properly, correctly or is still in a weakened condition.These assumptions form the basic nature of all injuries.
Injuries happen when the body is introduced to more stress than it can handle. This can be blunt force trauma, too many nights without sleep or a nagging thought that goes unanswered. But what happens when an injury takes place? The body compensates for it. It stiffens, inflames, and releases protective coatings all in a relatively short period of time. Not only does the body apply a solution to the affected area, it also compensates by placing the former workload onto other muscles.
In the case of muscular injury, other muscles will acquire the former workload. A limp will form, shoulders will sags, necks will refuse to revolve, and all because the body is finding a way to continue moving while hurting. Given a continuous injury without proper recovery time, and more injuries will occur. New acute injuries will form as the body succumbs to stress, or old injuries that were never fully healed will resurface. In short, not dealing with an injury properly can cause more injuries in the future.
I understand this from personal experience. When I was in college I hurt my ankle. I didn't rehab it properly and assumed that when it had stopped hurting it had fully healed. As the rest of my body compensated for my ankle, I pulled my left hamstring. Which lead to a pulled right hamstring, another pulled left hamstring, a tight right hip flexor, a stubbornly stiff left low back, which made its way up to the right side of my neck and down to the left shoulder. Now to be perfectly honest, I was recruiting these muscles to pole vault. But the root of my injury started in my foot and worked its way up my body. Why? Because the body is a kinetic chain, it all starts and stops with our feet.
In the last year, I have made substantial strides in strengthen my feet through a pair of funny looking shoes called five-finger toes. I noticed that as my body got used to the new shoes, kinetic chain issues in my knees, hip flexors and lower back began to resolve themselves. All I had to do was not over do it.
As my legs got healthier, so did my back and shoulders, but my shoulders would not heal on their own due to other chronic injuries exacerbated by heavy lifting. What can I say, I love fitness! And while moving kept my body feeling healthy, it didn't provide the recovery exercises I needed to fully strengthen and re-align my aching left shoulder. Today when I went into the gym, I went specifically to work at the pace of my left shoulder. I worked my shoulders in tandem so I wouldn't be lopsided. And guess what happened? I hurt the right side of my neck :) Why? Because of the kinetic chain of injuries I created while in college. It's not simply about addressing one or two target areas to be healthy, but addressing my whole body and bringing it into a state of health. Which is hard when all I want to do is run, jump, sprint, do burpees and have fun. I need to move from a place of health, work through and out of injuries and get myself back to a place where I can do what I love.
I would consider this a common fitness axiom, but is much harder to do than say. We can always go a bit further, even when we're starting to feel a little discomfort. Especially since running feels so good!Which is how I ended up with a strained hamstring today. I knew it was a little uncomfortable, but I thought I would be fine. I really wanted to do some barefoot sprinting! Injuries aren't always predictable :)
Where's the spirituality in this? Consider that ALL injuries happen this way, not just physical injuries, but mental and emotional too. We push too hard because we find something that we really want and really like, only to find that we've gone to far and hurt ourselves. When we hurt ourselves emotionally, we need time to recover, just as the body does from a sprain or tight-pinching muscle group. Do we like sitting around waiting to recover? No. Do we always do what we need to, to fully recover before getting up and back on the field? No, once the pain is gone, or manageable, we get back out on the field and keep playing. The problem with this mentality is that it begins a chain of linked injuries, taking a lot of time and focus to undo. I think I can spare the biblical examples on this because we all know its true; to live is to become injured. I can think of no person who has never had to deal with an injury in their life. I know people who have not broken bones, but have broken hearts. I know people who've never risked their heart, but have very low functioning bodies (I consider this an injury, as it stems from a place of discomfort while moving, usually the result of a muscle imbalance, poor habits or a physical deformity) Injury isn't always something that happens due to an accident, sometimes we are born injured, as in the case of a physical deformity. By no means do I consider this a reason for inactivity, everyone can find a way, find a pattern and get active! As long as we can still breath we can move and make something with what we have. We are never without hope.
If I were to use a biblical concept for the way I am using injury, that word would be sin. We all deal with injury; we are all sinners. We all have portions of our bodies and our emotions that suffer from a kinetic chain of injury; we all sin enough for it to cause problems in our lives. We are born with the propensity to injury ourselves; we are all born sinners. It's not that sin causes us to sin, its part of who we are. And since sin is like an injury, it too can be dealt with. It can be overcome. But in order for it to be overcome, we must walk in the ways of one who doesn't sin. Which means that we must walk in the ways that no human is fully capable of walking. Which means that God himself would have to show us a better way to walk, and live it before our eyes. This is who Jesus is. God in the flesh. Fully man, with all the temptations and injuries; fully God, able to overcome and resist them.
Jesus works with a lot of injured people. The only people he can help are those who admit their injured. Everyone else he can't help, because they won't listen to his words of healing; they don't listen to his words because they sound foreign, incapable of helping with the pain of their current injury. Jesus wants everyone to be whole. He has the capacity to do that, and has already overcome every injury imaginable. He faced them all when he died on the cross. And he died to show he had power over the greatest injury. Death. Jesus experienced all our injuries and took them with him to the cross. He took all of my relational hamstrings, stubborn minded shoulders, unlistening ankles and gave me the chance to be whole. All I have to do is follow his lead, and accept him as healer of my life. Which is of course easier said than done.
Healing isn't easy. The worst pain imaginable is when a physical trainer puts all his effort into the tight knot of a strained hamstring. It hurts worse than broken bones, but is necessary to break up scar tissue. Healing doesn't always have to hurt, as there are slow thoughtful daily movements we can make to slowly overcome our injuries, but sometimes we need to set broken bones by re-breaking them. So what does the healing of Jesus feel like? It's slow and easy, yet hard and painful. Most of the time it's hard and painful is because I've become so entrenched in the way an injury makes me move, that I've forgotten what healthy movement feels like. These are the times I find the most challenging, I know I need to change my habits, but I don't know how to change them.
Does following Jesus mean we will be injury free? No, but it does mean that we will always have a trainer we can turn to for help. Someone who understands what we're going through because he went through it too and he overcame it. He gives us the strength to overcome any injury we face. No matter how gnarly or how long we've had it. He can even heal the injuries we are born with. He is that powerful.
So why aren't we following Jesus? Because we think we can heal on our own. Which usually means we go just far enough, until our current injuries stop hurting so bad, only to find new ways of bringing back old pains. Jesus can put our old pains to rest. He can restore us to running and jumping and burpees in all areas of life! That is why I follow him, even when I trip and stumble, because I know he'll always reach a hand out to me and help me back on my feet, even when I don't know what to do next.
Injury. It may be a pulled hamstring or a broken heart, but all injuries fall into two categories: acute or chronic. An acute injury is something that has never happened before. It may come suddenly in an accident, or there may be a period of wearing down until finally something tears. In the case of a chronic injury, an acute injury has already taken place, but it has either not healed properly, correctly or is still in a weakened condition.These assumptions form the basic nature of all injuries.
Injuries happen when the body is introduced to more stress than it can handle. This can be blunt force trauma, too many nights without sleep or a nagging thought that goes unanswered. But what happens when an injury takes place? The body compensates for it. It stiffens, inflames, and releases protective coatings all in a relatively short period of time. Not only does the body apply a solution to the affected area, it also compensates by placing the former workload onto other muscles.
In the case of muscular injury, other muscles will acquire the former workload. A limp will form, shoulders will sags, necks will refuse to revolve, and all because the body is finding a way to continue moving while hurting. Given a continuous injury without proper recovery time, and more injuries will occur. New acute injuries will form as the body succumbs to stress, or old injuries that were never fully healed will resurface. In short, not dealing with an injury properly can cause more injuries in the future.
I understand this from personal experience. When I was in college I hurt my ankle. I didn't rehab it properly and assumed that when it had stopped hurting it had fully healed. As the rest of my body compensated for my ankle, I pulled my left hamstring. Which lead to a pulled right hamstring, another pulled left hamstring, a tight right hip flexor, a stubbornly stiff left low back, which made its way up to the right side of my neck and down to the left shoulder. Now to be perfectly honest, I was recruiting these muscles to pole vault. But the root of my injury started in my foot and worked its way up my body. Why? Because the body is a kinetic chain, it all starts and stops with our feet.
In the last year, I have made substantial strides in strengthen my feet through a pair of funny looking shoes called five-finger toes. I noticed that as my body got used to the new shoes, kinetic chain issues in my knees, hip flexors and lower back began to resolve themselves. All I had to do was not over do it.
As my legs got healthier, so did my back and shoulders, but my shoulders would not heal on their own due to other chronic injuries exacerbated by heavy lifting. What can I say, I love fitness! And while moving kept my body feeling healthy, it didn't provide the recovery exercises I needed to fully strengthen and re-align my aching left shoulder. Today when I went into the gym, I went specifically to work at the pace of my left shoulder. I worked my shoulders in tandem so I wouldn't be lopsided. And guess what happened? I hurt the right side of my neck :) Why? Because of the kinetic chain of injuries I created while in college. It's not simply about addressing one or two target areas to be healthy, but addressing my whole body and bringing it into a state of health. Which is hard when all I want to do is run, jump, sprint, do burpees and have fun. I need to move from a place of health, work through and out of injuries and get myself back to a place where I can do what I love.
I would consider this a common fitness axiom, but is much harder to do than say. We can always go a bit further, even when we're starting to feel a little discomfort. Especially since running feels so good!Which is how I ended up with a strained hamstring today. I knew it was a little uncomfortable, but I thought I would be fine. I really wanted to do some barefoot sprinting! Injuries aren't always predictable :)
Where's the spirituality in this? Consider that ALL injuries happen this way, not just physical injuries, but mental and emotional too. We push too hard because we find something that we really want and really like, only to find that we've gone to far and hurt ourselves. When we hurt ourselves emotionally, we need time to recover, just as the body does from a sprain or tight-pinching muscle group. Do we like sitting around waiting to recover? No. Do we always do what we need to, to fully recover before getting up and back on the field? No, once the pain is gone, or manageable, we get back out on the field and keep playing. The problem with this mentality is that it begins a chain of linked injuries, taking a lot of time and focus to undo. I think I can spare the biblical examples on this because we all know its true; to live is to become injured. I can think of no person who has never had to deal with an injury in their life. I know people who have not broken bones, but have broken hearts. I know people who've never risked their heart, but have very low functioning bodies (I consider this an injury, as it stems from a place of discomfort while moving, usually the result of a muscle imbalance, poor habits or a physical deformity) Injury isn't always something that happens due to an accident, sometimes we are born injured, as in the case of a physical deformity. By no means do I consider this a reason for inactivity, everyone can find a way, find a pattern and get active! As long as we can still breath we can move and make something with what we have. We are never without hope.
If I were to use a biblical concept for the way I am using injury, that word would be sin. We all deal with injury; we are all sinners. We all have portions of our bodies and our emotions that suffer from a kinetic chain of injury; we all sin enough for it to cause problems in our lives. We are born with the propensity to injury ourselves; we are all born sinners. It's not that sin causes us to sin, its part of who we are. And since sin is like an injury, it too can be dealt with. It can be overcome. But in order for it to be overcome, we must walk in the ways of one who doesn't sin. Which means that we must walk in the ways that no human is fully capable of walking. Which means that God himself would have to show us a better way to walk, and live it before our eyes. This is who Jesus is. God in the flesh. Fully man, with all the temptations and injuries; fully God, able to overcome and resist them.
Jesus works with a lot of injured people. The only people he can help are those who admit their injured. Everyone else he can't help, because they won't listen to his words of healing; they don't listen to his words because they sound foreign, incapable of helping with the pain of their current injury. Jesus wants everyone to be whole. He has the capacity to do that, and has already overcome every injury imaginable. He faced them all when he died on the cross. And he died to show he had power over the greatest injury. Death. Jesus experienced all our injuries and took them with him to the cross. He took all of my relational hamstrings, stubborn minded shoulders, unlistening ankles and gave me the chance to be whole. All I have to do is follow his lead, and accept him as healer of my life. Which is of course easier said than done.
Healing isn't easy. The worst pain imaginable is when a physical trainer puts all his effort into the tight knot of a strained hamstring. It hurts worse than broken bones, but is necessary to break up scar tissue. Healing doesn't always have to hurt, as there are slow thoughtful daily movements we can make to slowly overcome our injuries, but sometimes we need to set broken bones by re-breaking them. So what does the healing of Jesus feel like? It's slow and easy, yet hard and painful. Most of the time it's hard and painful is because I've become so entrenched in the way an injury makes me move, that I've forgotten what healthy movement feels like. These are the times I find the most challenging, I know I need to change my habits, but I don't know how to change them.
Does following Jesus mean we will be injury free? No, but it does mean that we will always have a trainer we can turn to for help. Someone who understands what we're going through because he went through it too and he overcame it. He gives us the strength to overcome any injury we face. No matter how gnarly or how long we've had it. He can even heal the injuries we are born with. He is that powerful.
So why aren't we following Jesus? Because we think we can heal on our own. Which usually means we go just far enough, until our current injuries stop hurting so bad, only to find new ways of bringing back old pains. Jesus can put our old pains to rest. He can restore us to running and jumping and burpees in all areas of life! That is why I follow him, even when I trip and stumble, because I know he'll always reach a hand out to me and help me back on my feet, even when I don't know what to do next.
Sunday, June 2, 2013
Peace after struggle
"In the course of time, David defeated the Philistines and subdued them, and he took Metheg Ammah from the control of the Philistines. David also defeated the Moabites... So the Moabites became subject to David and brought tribute. Moreover, David fought Hadadezer son of Rehob, king of Zobah, when he went to restore his control along the Euphrates River. David captured a thousand of his chariots, seven thousand charioteers and twenty thousand foot soldiers. He hamstrung all but a hundred of the chariot horses. When the Arameans of Damascus came to help Hadadezer king of Zobah, David struck down twenty-two thousand of them. He put garrisons in the Aramean kingdom of Damascus, and the Arameans became subject to him and brought tribute. The LORD gave David victory wherever he went... David reigned over all Israel, doing what was just and right for all his people."
"...and the LORD had given him rest from all his enemies around him,"
Peace. When I think of the struggles many face today, finding peace is one of them. There are numerous reasons why we are not at peace. External forces such as the economy, unfavorable working situations and social conflict often combine themselves into a miasma of heaviness and hopelessness. Internal forces such as personal fulfillment, vocational achievement, physical condition and mental aspiration add to geopolitical dilemmas, often making us ponder the purpose of life. A spirit of aporia begins to overtake us and the darkness of depression rumbles the coming storm overheard. It would seem in times such as these, that peace is just one step too far away. Yet for all the foreboding darkness of the internal and external, I believe there is peace. It often comes after great conflict, but it also can be found in the midst of swirling chaos. My peace is based on my hope in the LORD and his desire to see His world righted.
As an athlete, I intimately understand injury and physical pain. I can tell you the qualitative difference between sprains, strains, hairline fractures and compound breaks. I can also speak of the bitter disappointment of lost time, of season ending injuries that not only take away a year, but have lasting effects in the future. I can speak of coming within quarter inches of a goal, only to be found wanting. I can speak of unhealed and twisted muscle fibers, from years of ever so slightly improper movements, and the arduous task of retraining my body to wash away the pain stemming from the fitness I love. It would seem that in all this struggle there is no peace. And if my goals were solely based on performance, then perhaps I would not have it, just years of memories of not quite being good enough. But the peace I have and experience comes from the days when I feel the aches and pains subside. When I see that all of the injuries and damages can be healed, that my body can be whole; if only I keep pressing onward. The danger often found when chasing peace is giving up too soon. Instead of giving up because we have not found what we are chasing, we should change the way we run after our desire. Peace is not found after a hard chase, that feeling is exhaustion, but peace is found when we slowly and resolutely pursue a goal or a dream, finally realizing its full potential. My body is far from its full potential, but on the days after hard work, when I realize that old pains are subsiding I find solace in the comfort of a loving and healing God, despite years of unsatisfying struggle.
David's struggles as King were often against other men. There are few challenges greater than facing physical opponents, and there is a sweet joy in victory when we know we have attained something that can never be taken from us. In the peace David found after years of fighting other nations, was solace in fact that God loved him. God loved David so much He made an everlasting covenant with him, because David honored God with his life; he loved God by the way he lived. David's love led him to do very foolish things, like dance in the streets only wearing an ephod or show kindness to those who unjustly tried to kill him. But because of his love, and even through all of his faults, God made a David a promise. A promise that there would always be a man of his lineage on the throne of an eternal kingdom. This didn't mean that David's kingdom would last forever, in truth it split apart shortly after the death of his son. But God wasn't promising David an earthly kingdom of peace, he was promising him an eternal peace available in every kingdom.
When I think on such peace, I am reminded that the love of God brings peace. It may not settle external conflicts, but it can settle our internal strife. God's goal is to settle the external conflicts through internal peace. When I meditate on the love of God, its very disarming; God has no desire for us to shout and stab at each other. It's not his will that we raise our voices against one another. He does not desire to fill us with rage that will conquer and consume our enemies, but instead desires to fill us with a peace, causing us to lay our weapons down. In the laying down of our earthly weapons, we take up weapons of righteousness. We defend ourselves not with anger, but with truth. We attack not out of defiance, but out of unselfish desire for resolution. We fight, not because we must, but because we believe God acting through us is capable of bringing an end to the conflict surrounding us. It's not that we will bring an end to all conflict forever, for this is not our role, but that there can be an end to some conflicts within our lifetimes, even if only for a brief moment.
How is it this is attainable? By falling on His peace and love. By letting go of our doubts and fears and trusting he wants our conflicts to end; trusting in His character to bring us home and give us peace on every side. Yes, there will be a struggle for this peace, and yes, there will be those who oppose it. But the opposition does not have the fuel to finish the fight. Anger, malice and rage are quick burning simple carbs compared to the complex, whole-grained carbohydrates of God's love. It's the slow burning fires that last the longest, are the easiest to maintain and are the most successful in the end. Such is God's love; a fire that has an unquenchable source of fuel, God Himself. It is his love that fuels our own.
The love and peace of God are slow burning fires re-forging our broken world. Whether the pain we experience is physical, emotional or rooted in our surroundings, we can find the peace of God by focusing on His love. Such a peace reigned for a time when David was king, and such a peace can reign again when we set our eyes on His desires, not just the measurements of this world. God's love gives us more than could ever want; it fulfills our earthly desires, even as we sort through the painful experiences of this life and try to make sense of them.
On my best days, I focus on the love of God. This love brings me peace, reminding me that for all my gifts, I am not the one who brings peace to this world. I am simply one to find peace and live it as best I can. It is not for me to say what happens in the external, but for what happens in my internal. I would much rather dwell in the peace of God than a house of my own making. For the peace of God is better than the greatest houses built by human hands. It is this peace upon which I base my now, my fitness and my future.
"...and the LORD had given him rest from all his enemies around him,"
Peace. When I think of the struggles many face today, finding peace is one of them. There are numerous reasons why we are not at peace. External forces such as the economy, unfavorable working situations and social conflict often combine themselves into a miasma of heaviness and hopelessness. Internal forces such as personal fulfillment, vocational achievement, physical condition and mental aspiration add to geopolitical dilemmas, often making us ponder the purpose of life. A spirit of aporia begins to overtake us and the darkness of depression rumbles the coming storm overheard. It would seem in times such as these, that peace is just one step too far away. Yet for all the foreboding darkness of the internal and external, I believe there is peace. It often comes after great conflict, but it also can be found in the midst of swirling chaos. My peace is based on my hope in the LORD and his desire to see His world righted.
As an athlete, I intimately understand injury and physical pain. I can tell you the qualitative difference between sprains, strains, hairline fractures and compound breaks. I can also speak of the bitter disappointment of lost time, of season ending injuries that not only take away a year, but have lasting effects in the future. I can speak of coming within quarter inches of a goal, only to be found wanting. I can speak of unhealed and twisted muscle fibers, from years of ever so slightly improper movements, and the arduous task of retraining my body to wash away the pain stemming from the fitness I love. It would seem that in all this struggle there is no peace. And if my goals were solely based on performance, then perhaps I would not have it, just years of memories of not quite being good enough. But the peace I have and experience comes from the days when I feel the aches and pains subside. When I see that all of the injuries and damages can be healed, that my body can be whole; if only I keep pressing onward. The danger often found when chasing peace is giving up too soon. Instead of giving up because we have not found what we are chasing, we should change the way we run after our desire. Peace is not found after a hard chase, that feeling is exhaustion, but peace is found when we slowly and resolutely pursue a goal or a dream, finally realizing its full potential. My body is far from its full potential, but on the days after hard work, when I realize that old pains are subsiding I find solace in the comfort of a loving and healing God, despite years of unsatisfying struggle.
David's struggles as King were often against other men. There are few challenges greater than facing physical opponents, and there is a sweet joy in victory when we know we have attained something that can never be taken from us. In the peace David found after years of fighting other nations, was solace in fact that God loved him. God loved David so much He made an everlasting covenant with him, because David honored God with his life; he loved God by the way he lived. David's love led him to do very foolish things, like dance in the streets only wearing an ephod or show kindness to those who unjustly tried to kill him. But because of his love, and even through all of his faults, God made a David a promise. A promise that there would always be a man of his lineage on the throne of an eternal kingdom. This didn't mean that David's kingdom would last forever, in truth it split apart shortly after the death of his son. But God wasn't promising David an earthly kingdom of peace, he was promising him an eternal peace available in every kingdom.
When I think on such peace, I am reminded that the love of God brings peace. It may not settle external conflicts, but it can settle our internal strife. God's goal is to settle the external conflicts through internal peace. When I meditate on the love of God, its very disarming; God has no desire for us to shout and stab at each other. It's not his will that we raise our voices against one another. He does not desire to fill us with rage that will conquer and consume our enemies, but instead desires to fill us with a peace, causing us to lay our weapons down. In the laying down of our earthly weapons, we take up weapons of righteousness. We defend ourselves not with anger, but with truth. We attack not out of defiance, but out of unselfish desire for resolution. We fight, not because we must, but because we believe God acting through us is capable of bringing an end to the conflict surrounding us. It's not that we will bring an end to all conflict forever, for this is not our role, but that there can be an end to some conflicts within our lifetimes, even if only for a brief moment.
How is it this is attainable? By falling on His peace and love. By letting go of our doubts and fears and trusting he wants our conflicts to end; trusting in His character to bring us home and give us peace on every side. Yes, there will be a struggle for this peace, and yes, there will be those who oppose it. But the opposition does not have the fuel to finish the fight. Anger, malice and rage are quick burning simple carbs compared to the complex, whole-grained carbohydrates of God's love. It's the slow burning fires that last the longest, are the easiest to maintain and are the most successful in the end. Such is God's love; a fire that has an unquenchable source of fuel, God Himself. It is his love that fuels our own.
The love and peace of God are slow burning fires re-forging our broken world. Whether the pain we experience is physical, emotional or rooted in our surroundings, we can find the peace of God by focusing on His love. Such a peace reigned for a time when David was king, and such a peace can reign again when we set our eyes on His desires, not just the measurements of this world. God's love gives us more than could ever want; it fulfills our earthly desires, even as we sort through the painful experiences of this life and try to make sense of them.
On my best days, I focus on the love of God. This love brings me peace, reminding me that for all my gifts, I am not the one who brings peace to this world. I am simply one to find peace and live it as best I can. It is not for me to say what happens in the external, but for what happens in my internal. I would much rather dwell in the peace of God than a house of my own making. For the peace of God is better than the greatest houses built by human hands. It is this peace upon which I base my now, my fitness and my future.
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