So I went to the gym yesterday.
I promise this blog is not morphing into a fitness motivation account, bear with me:
I went to the gym for the first time in 5 months, and oh my word the mental battle it was to actually get there. When I was going last time, I wasn't in a great headspace and didn't have the right focus. So yesterday, it took an hour to get out of my bed and into my car to the gym, because I was going over everything that it was like before. Was I going to be letting that in again? Shutting out the world with my loud angry music playlist and making it a me-zone, angling myself for progress pictures and feeding my negative body image, staying up late to go to the gym at midnight so no one else would be there, measuring myself by the numbers, judging myself for what workouts I did there and which equipment I used etc. It's actually ironic the mental struggle it was to go to the gym, because the whole point I was picking it up again was for an event fundraising and advocating for mental health support!
So it took a lot for me to finally get up and go, and often when you're doing something like a workout, the mindset strength is needed for completing the actual workout, but I realised that sometimes even facing the battle is winning a battle itself. It was progress for me to get to the gym, let alone do that workout - and that is okay! God knows your story and the experiences you have been through in life, the ones you are going through now, and the ones you are yet to go through. He knows that sometimes getting up and standing in the face of a trial is a trial in and of itself. If it's more than a small feat for you, then don't think God belittles it.
So He is calling us to step out of fear! “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust; I shall not be afraid. What can flesh do to me?”
(Psalm 56:3-4) He wants you to let Him give you the strength to not only stand up and face your battles, but to win them to for His glory. "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." (Isaiah 40:31) Take courage to step out of your past that has held you back, don't let it have that power over you. It may look like moving on, or it could look like revisiting it but with a different outlook - either way you do not need to let your past ideas and actions dictate your current ones. God doesn't keep you in your past so why should you?
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