We were meant for Connection

 "Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing." 1 Thessalonians 5:11

Saturday was a total snow bomb. We were going to run trails and one by one we cancelled. As beautiful as it was outside, running outside was not an option. 

Andy and I shamelessly planned to go the GAC. But the rest of our group did not have access to the indoor track. The Lord has blessed me, I invited my friends to meet us out there with our passes. 

Goals

We all have goals. Some goals are altogether different than others but encouraging one another helps. We showed up helping one another. We have different strengths, different weaknesses, different goals, but we lifted one another up. 

Sunday was no different. After church Andy and I went out to help our friend, Sarah run her long run. It is her first marathon and she had 15 miles to run, the LONGEST distance she had ever run. 

There is a fear there, when we venture into unfamiliar territory our headspace gets clustered with fear and anxiety. For me being alone with that headspace is very challenging, having someone there for me gives me courage, strength and encouragement. 

ISOLATION

My friend Erin sent me a podcast to listen to last week. It was a Christian speaker discussing isolation. 

A gentle reminder of the problems with isolation and the power of connection. 

I have had seasons of isolation. The place depression lurks, creeps so close that its shadow romances you and embrace you more than people do, or so we try to believe. 

That place you question your purpose, your passion and your place in the world. 

CONNECTION

People can add value to our lives. Yes, they are challenging, but they also challenge us to be better. 

Life isn't met to be journeyed alone. 

Life can be too hard to be alone.

But Life can also be TOO wonderful to do alone. 

GRACE

It takes grace to show up for people and it takes grace to let others show up for you. 

People will let you down. Oh man do I know this. But the other side of that truth is I too have let others down. 

People will lift you up, love you, embrace you, people will teach you and guide you.  

"Bear ye one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ." Gal. 6:2

Solo is SELF. We have all been wounded by others. But when we encourage one another, it encourages us. 

Relate don't compare. Listen with love. 

"Let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, Not neglecting to meet together, as the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day draw near." Hebrews 10:24-25

Accountability partners. 

Discipleship. 

Iron sharpens Iron. 

"And we urge you brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with them all." 1 Thess. 5:14

Be authentic, and people will accept you as you are and have a safe place to be their authentic selves. Share your weakness with confidence, fearlessly because your greatest audience is eternal not earthly. 

RUNDOWN:

The balance. Running is not the vision you see. It is all that you don't see. What you see is just a biproduct of the unseen. 

You see a smile. You see a victory. You see miles. You see through YOUR lens. But what you don't see is my heart. You don't see those hours my legs are turning over, and my soul is naked to the Lord. 

It is my church, and not in a spiritual sense, in an intimacy with my Father. 

I embrace my solo runs with my heavenly Father. Because I need Him to be on the Throne of my Heart before everything else. 

"The Fight is won or lost away from witnesses-behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights." Mahummad Ali

In Peace, Not Pieces, 

Anita~