January

This year I decided not to make any New Year's resolutions.  Mostly because I don't understand my new life yet.  My idea of success has drastically changed in recent months, and I don't even know what I have any desire to achieve yet.  Some days, moving from plaid PJs to yoga pants is a great success.  Other days, I feel like I am doing pretty well in the world if I actually step outside of my apartment.  I have some normal days too, where I interact with other speaking humans.  Those days are money.  So, I decided to just resolve to be healthy, happy, and better than I was last year.  I still don't really know what that means yet, but I am working on it every day.

One thing that David and I have undertaken together is a fitness program on campus.  It's a spoof off of Biggest Loser, and we are on competing teams.

My fellow blue teammates seem fun enough and our trainers are little blonde 20-year-old babies.  I forget how much older I am than the average college student sometimes.  Friday night, we attended the opening ceremonies and met our teams, trainers, and nutritionists.  Tonight will be our first official team workout.  Is it weird that I am kind of nervous?  I feel like it's the first day of PE all over again.  The panic of not wanting to be the last one, or the one who couldn't make a basket.  I don't want to be that girl. :)  I never considered myself an athlete.  I dreaded feeling dumb because I couldn't measure up.  But this is not really about the competition.  At the opening ceremonies, the director of the program (a skinny twig-of-a-dude) told us about how everyone faces their own challenges in this life.  He is directing this program for the fifth semester, not because he has ever had weight problems.  Quite the contrary.  When he was twelve, he was diagnosed with Hodgkin Lymphoma.   He showed us some pictures and told us how hard chemotherapy was.  He told us his story to show that you can look at anyone around you and think that you have it harder than they do.  He looks like a perfectly healthy RM, ready to take on anything.  No one could guess the struggle he has been through by merely looking at him.  He talked about how our bodies are amazing temples built to house the spirit.  As he was going through the worst parts of chemo, he said it was extremely difficult to feel the spirit.  He was always on so many drugs, and his body was not functioning the way it was meant to.  He compared this to being overweight.  Our bodies are not designed to be sluggish or burdened by excess fat.  Just like going through chemo, it is harder to feel the spirit when our bodies are not in a healthy state, regardless of the cause.  By participating in this program, I obviously hope to lose the baby fat, gain endurance, and become more physically fit.

I had never correlated physical health with capacity to feel the spirit in my life before.  I am glad our director brought this to my attention, and I can make it a goal to increase that ability as well.

The Word of Wisdom promises us spiritual blessings for physical health, so I don't know why I have never considered the reverse to be true.  If we don't have physical health, we can't receive those spiritual blessings as well. We are promised wisdom and hidden treasures of knowledge.  Perhaps, being unhealthy diminishes our ability to perform to our best mental capacity.

Elder Packer said, "The Word of Wisdom does not promise you perfect health, but it teachers how to keep the body you were born with in the best condition and your mind alert to delicate spiritual promptings...Surely the Word of Wisdom was given so that you may keep the delicate, sensitive, spiritual part of your nature on proper alert.  Learn to 'listen' to your feelings.  You will be guided and warned and taught and blessed...Your young dreams can be realized.  All of your worth, natural physical and emotional desires can be satisfied.  You can find a companion to whom you can offer a body free from addiction, from depressants, from stimulants, and a mind sensitive to spiritual guidance and impressions."

So, one of my primary goals in this program is to gain more of the spirit in my life. :)