The Hungry Soul...

I couldn't sleep last night.

I got up not long after trying to sleep and zombied into the living room to aimlessly search the net. I don't remember how it happend but I ended up on a site for online courses to be a certified personal trainer.

Go ahead, laugh, get it out of your system.


I laughed too. I mean, I'm easily 20 pounds overweight (which is still better than the 45-50 I used to be) and if I had to name my vice it would be overeating. But the truth is, I have a degree in Theology and if wretchedness were body fat I'd be morbidly obese. I guess we don't need to be perfect to help others do we?

So, here's the dream. It didn't just emerge last night though, I've thought about this for a long time. We gravitate toward our own illness don't we? People who survive cancer become motivational speakers to those still suffering. Mothers who've lost children to kidnapping begin foundations in their childs name to protect other children from the same fate. People have a desire to help others with the pain they themselves have experienced and ARE experiencing. What is my pain if not my sin and my lack of self control when it comes to food?

So, what do theology and the body have to do with each other? Everything. What if I were minimally trained in both and anointed by God to bless other people by teaching them the truth of their humanity, their womanhood, their manhood. What if people learned who it is that Christ reveals them to be in the WHOLE of their person? If we could get, or atleast work toward, the fact that our person is not something seperate from our body but that we ARE our body and are more than our body.
I'm not talking about some infomercial gimmick weight loss thing. What if I could be a "PERSONal" trainer, and meet with women like myself and help them find the dignity of their person in their body, mind, and spirit....together. I mean, ultimately it should be that health is just naturally what our life gravitates toward right? We shouldn't have to set aside an hour to 'work out' or a time in our life to 'diet'. I can't imagine Mother Mary stressing about her weight and struggling over that last slice of pita bread. People used to work and live in a way that they naturally burned the calories that they should and the foods they ate were natural and healthy anyway. I think seeking holiness has to include this. Also, it could be a way to educate people on the greater worth of their person...through the teachings of the Church.

Can a saint be overweight? It's a valid question. I think healthy people aren't necessarily on the path to holiness but I think seeking goodness for your whole self has got to be part of it. In some capacity? I don't know, I mean it's not like St. Therese was going out for a 15 mile run everyday, but then again food and activity probably held their proper place in her life.
Ya get me? Like, it's not normal for me to obsess about dieting or workout a million hours a day anymore than it is normal for me to overeat and be lazy. Food is something we should enjoy and mostly be thankful for because of how it nurtures our body but it shouldn't hold a place of priority in our life. It shouldn't be that which comforts me or that which pacifies me or that which owns me. It has been all of those things...and in some ways continues to be.

At about 2:30 a.m I finally decided I needed to go to bed. It took all I had not to wake hubby up to tell him about my new brilliant ideas. I figured that would be cruel since he was sound asleep. After a few minutes of tring to sleep again hubby got up because he decided it was too hot in the room to sleep. He went into the living room to read and I tried AGAIN to sleep. Got up again and read....tried to sleep again.

Finally! I guess around 4 I fell asleep. Ah.

At 4:30 hubby says (waking me cold out of a dead sleep) "Just so you know, there's a program that you can get that can help you to record sound online to input into the composition program on Mac."

Silence....

Are you serious? I've been trying to sleep since 11:30 and I FINALLY fall asleep and you decide this the optimal moment to wake me to tell me about a music recording program? This is a joke right? You're joking?

He wasn't joking.


So what do you think about all this?