STUCK OR COMMITTED

PRACTICE: Does a current routine feel like drudgery? Why?

Are you stuck in a rut or are you committed to a special relationship, job, particular practice, ineffective zoom call? I am asking because everything that routinely occupies our time and effort ought to be routinely examined. Sometimes merely asking yourself or asking a friend, “why do you do ____?” is enough to get the thinking going. “Why do I stay in this relationship or this job or this ...?”

If what we routinely do, diminishes us and feels like a waste of time, then it is time to re-evaluate our time and energy and to act.

To be clear – this can be true of a good relationship, a good job or practice but is especially true when things have gone wrong. “Am I stuck in a rut or am I committed to this? Am I just putting in my time? Or Am I committed to the time it takes to bear the fruit that I expect to harvest?

Most often, these questions are applicable to my practices around physical activity, diet, and meal preparations. The questions looping in my head sound something like this a day or two every week. “Am I just wasting my time? Am I doing this routine again because it is easy, and I don’t need to think what to do? Will these single arm rows produce the strong arms and back I desire? Does it matter what I make for dinner or does this meal support the ten-pound weight loss goal? Stuck or committed?

When the answer is, “feeling stuck,” I intellectually know it is time to change something. It may take a while for the something to happen because change means movement. Movement means being unsettled and uncomfortable for a bit. Being a creature of habit, most often I choose to change one thing…add a new strength building exercise or cook a new nutritious meal. I recently made buffalo cauliflower mac and cheese for Sunday dinner – delicious.

What I can confidently say about most things in my life is that “I am committed to the principle but stuck sometimes in a rut with the actions that may help me to live out the principles.

I am committed to a healthy lifestyle but exercising and cooking can be sheer drudgery. It is a struggle. What are your struggles?

I feel empowered by acknowledging the struggle.

Galatians 6:9

PONDER THIS THOUGHT---- “Taking a new step, uttering a new word is what people fear the most.” Dostoyevsky