Meditating to focus

One of my promises to myself this year was to start drawing closer to God through my prayers, listening, praise and worship and meditations. 

In January, I spent most of the month seeking first God's kingdom and His righteousness.  (Matthew 6:33) I've made some decisions on what I can do throughout this year to work on my relationship with God.
Yesterday, I came up with something that got me all excited.  As I continued my activity earlier this morning, I decided it was blog worthy.

One of our promises for the year is to run a 5k, 10k and Half Marathon.  As much as I enjoy exercising (sort of), the results of exercising...I have a hard time getting started.  Running is especially hard for me.  I feel like while I run, all I do is focus on reasons why I should stop.

I started "training" this past week, along with my P90X workout.  It has been a hard week starting back...but I digress.  The first day I was able to complete my run.  Yes, I was tired.  Yes, it hurt.  Yes, I wanted to quit; but I kept going.  Day 2 (yesterday) of my run, I got about .4 miles out and stopped.  I was winded and my body was all achy and didn't want to cooperate.  I stood there thinking to myself, "Man...I don't think I can do this.  I don't even think I want to do this..."  I probably stood there for a minute debating whether I should just walk to my destination or continue running.

Finally, a thought occurred to me.  I've never really liked running.  I started doing it more regularly when I joined a boot camp a few years ago.  After that, it just became a habit for me to incorporate it into my workouts.  When we moved to LA, something that really helped me was Slacker Radio and Pandora on my phone.  I could put in my headphones and listen to worship music while I ran.  Running became my time with God.  Doing this, I found myself wanting to run more and more just to spend more time with God.

I now have no functioning headphones, so I am not able to do that right now.  I thought about this yesterday as I stood on the bridge trying to decide if I wanted to complete my run.  Then I realized, I had something better, scripture.  So I said to myself, "Self, why don't you meditate on God's word while you run?!  That way, you'll start focusing on Him and stop focusing on the pain and discomfort of running."

So that's what I did.  I meditated on Psalm 23 and Isaiah 40:31

Psalm 23 "The lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever."

Isaiah 40:31 was especially helpful since I was running. "But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."

So I incorporated this activity into my run and I felt so good.  Not only was I working out my body, but I was also working out my spirit.  It felt so great, that I just wanted to keep on running.  Of course, I reached my destination, so I was able to stop running.  But that's when the idea came to me.

I realized that it would be a good idea for me to start using my running time to memorize scriptures and meditate on them.  I got so excited about it, I almost started screaming and jumping for joy.  I held it, though.  What a great way to keep my promises to myself!
growing more in my relationship with God.  

This idea is a fantastic idea for a few reasons:

1) As I said earlier, I will keep my 2011 promises by growing in my relationship with God

2)  AND, in running the 5k, 10k and Half Marathon.  I figure if I incorporate this activity into my running, I'll be encouraged to run more.

3) It will help me to memorize more scripture.

4) It will help me to learn how to meditate on God's word better.

5) It will take my focus off the pain and discomfort I feel when I run; and help me stay focused on God.

Reason 5 speaks volumes to me.  Running is not the only area in my life that has pain and discomfort.  If I use my running time to meditate on God's word and learn how to better take my focus off the pain and discomfort in that situation, I figure I'll be well practiced to apply this to the other areas and situations in my life where and when I experience all that pain and discomfort.  Coming to this conclusion was like a HUGE revelation ( or AHA! moment) for me.  I think that's why I got so excited that I wanted to jump up and down and yell.

Today, I ran for about 2 miles.  I was able to meditate on Phil 4:6-7 "Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus."  and put Phil 4:4 "Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice." into a song while running.  It was another successful run.  And now I've got those new scriptures memorized.  PTL!

We'll see how this goes.  I'm hoping it'll all work out.  I'm believing it will.  Mas luego!

PAR