Just keep swimming...

I have embarked on a new and dangerous adventure….I have started swimming as my cardio routine!!  Now before you get all impressed that I’m doing the “best cardio” possible- let me fill you in on the context.

I’m getting old and my body is falling apart. 

There is a very strong chance that I will be walking with a cane by 2015, and using a walker by 2017.  Sorry husband- I know that’s not exactly the image of a “young hip wife”… but I’ll be young in spirit!!! Assuming it’s before my 8:30pm bedtime.

Since any other type of physical exercise causes some pretty severe back pain for me, I succumbed to the idea of swimming for exercise.

I was dreading it because I know enough about it to know this much:

• It’s exhausting.
• It works all of your body so there are no “easy” days.
• I have to go for periods of time where I am literally holding my breath.
• I have to wear a swimsuit.
• I can’t listen to music. 
• I have to swim back and forth and back and forth and back and forth… can we say boredom??

But regardless, about 3 weeks ago, I joined the local pool and started swimming.  And then proceeded to wish I had told my husband I loved him that morning as the tragedy of death by drowning became a very real and obvious threat.

1st week- 1st day:

 I. almost. died. And gave up. And then began to hate the existence of water.

But I kept going by the grace of God…. And as I swam laps, I started coming up with any and every thought possible to distract me from the imminent threat of drowning. (By “swam laps” I mean, swam a lap, gasped for breath for 2 minutes, and then crossed back over, to gasp again.)

I sang the first verse of Amazing Grace about 4,283 times- for some reason that was the only song that I could remember every single word while trying to not die… Odd, I know. I thought of every Bible verse I have ever learned, including some phrases that I turned into Bible verses. (I’m blaming lack of oxygen to the brain).

I told myself stories…. I told myself I was swimming for Nemo… I thought about what the other swimmers must be like in “real life.” … Anything.

And I kept looking forward to that glorious blue mark on the wall. Because I knew if I could only make it to that wall, I would get to stop swimming and breathe for a minute. That was my finish line. My end goal. My target.

And yet, the wall always seemed so far away.  More than once, I would stop and tread water half-way there because I just couldn’t seem to make it.

 

And then this past week, I changed one thing… which has changed everything.

I didn’t look towards the wall as I swam.

I didn’t try to count the seconds until reaching the wall, I just focused on the swim. The floor of the pool is lined with a row of blue blocks in the middle of your lane so you know if you’re swimming straight. Those blue blocks became my focus and my target. I made sure I was swimming straight, and that was it. I didn’t look for the wall. I didn’t strain for the finish line. I just kept swimming. (Finding Nemo reference- anyone?)

And a surprising thing happened. I made it. I didn’t stop half-way. I didn’t die. And I actually swam a bit faster.

All because I focused on my path.

Now I realize this goes against every sport analogy for finishing strong possible. “Visualize the finish line!” “Shoot for the goal!” “Keep the end in mind!”

But sometimes, just sometimes, the finish line is just a bit too far. A bit too overwhelming. A bit too hard. We start to drown. We start to give-up. We start to gasp.

And we stop.

So I changed. And in doing so, I found that for me, the best way, and possibly the only way, is to swim stroke by stroke and not lap by lap.

Sometimes our life is a swimming pool.  The ability to make it through the next 28 days seems as impossible as swimming 28 laps. We get half-way through, 2 weeks in, and we start to gasp; to give up; to drown.

 So we stop. 

Isaiah 40:29-31 has become such a comfort because the promise to be able to soar is beautiful, but sometimes that seems incomprehensible. So I cling to the promise to walk.  

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak.  Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

So I walk, step by step. Focusing on the path that He has lit** and not the finish line that’s miles away. And one day, I’ll look up, and I’ll have made it. I didn’t stop half-way. I didn’t die. And I actually walked a bit faster.

Because I kept swimming, I’ve learned to keep walking.

**Ps 119:105 Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.