Resolutions

Every year at this time we tend to look back on where we have been and look forward to where we want to be.  One of the benefits of being deployed is plenty of time to reflect.  I have spent a lot of time thinking about things in my life that I want to improve or get rid of entirely.  One of the things that I have been thinking about is my weight.  Like many people, I have fluctuated in my weight ever since I got married.  There must be something in wedding cake that stops one’s metabolism.  After Connor was born my sweet Cami started a lifestyle change called Body For Life.  She did two consecutive 12-week periods of eating right and exercising and had such incredible results that I joined her for her third 12-weeks.  By the end we were both in the best shape of our lives.  We felt great and looked good too.

Originally I included our before picture but thought that I should get permission before I do.  This is after our 12-weeks of eating right and working out.  

Amazingly there is no shortcut to having a healthy strong body other than eating right and exercise.  It is almost as though there is a lesson to be learned there!

You would think that this picture would be a point of pride for me but it serves as a reminder of how far I've fallen.

  We maintained our figures for a short time and then fell back into old habits.  The lost pounds found their way back and I began to feel sluggish and wimpy again.  I know that this story is not unique to Cami and me but is one to which most can relate.  Years passed as did plenty of New Year’s resolutions to make changes that would lead to more permanent change.  There were periods during which I would meet my goals and drop some pounds and then would go right back to the same behaviors that got me in trouble to begin with.  Finding pounds was easy, losing them was hard.  I found that I had a talent for finding pounds and stopped trying to lose them.  I had a great job, lived in my dream home, had an amazing family and was literally living LARGE.  My weekly exercise consisted of walking behind my self-propelled lawn mower and occasionally helping someone move in or out.  I would still have the occasional desire to change, often associated with getting into my bathing suit which I become proficient in suppressing with a batch of cookies or two.  Things went on this way for years.  I would walk around comparing myself to those around me feeling justified by some and depressed by others.  I wasn’t happy.  I didn’t have any self control and I knew it.    

Hey, hey, hey!  Life was clearly treating me well, a little too well. 

It was at this time that I decided to change careers which meant going back to school.  My patient, wonderful wife supported me despite the great challenges this created for her and the kids, not the least of which was joining the United States Air Force.  In the back of my mind I remember thinking that in the military I would learn self-disciple and self-mastery which would be the solution to all my problems.  Not so.  After 30 months of school, living away from home while I did clinical rotations all over the country, I continued in my same well established habits.  Once I graduated and passed my board certification exam I went off to Commissioned Officer Training.  I was sure that this was the beginning of the end of my poor eating habits and roly-poly figure.  

These are pictures I took just before Commissioned Officer Training.  No need to exaggerate the belly fat, this is all natural.  

When I returned from training I was a few pounds lighter mostly because of a very short haircut.

To my great surprise the Air Force, out of necessity, had loosened its standards for physical fitness so that more people could pass.  I put my effort into getting into shape encouraged by the shrill voice of the drill sergeant always one step behind me.  I think the stress of that experience resulted in more weight loss than the exercise but I passed the physical assessment at the end of the 5 weeks without too much difficulty.  Life calmed back down as we settled into our new lives in San Antonio.  As a family we were introduced to Blue Bell ice cream, a Texas original that quickly became my new vice.  Once a year I was required to perform the physical fitness assessment which I found I could pass if I did push-ups and sit-ups for two weeks before and learned to ignore the desire to vomit while I ran. 

This story has now arrived at present day.  I am deployed in Afghanistan with lots of free time.  For the last twelve weeks I have done a decent job of exercising routinely and eating better than I did before I arrived.  I have seen good results in my physical appearance and in the way that feel.  

This is where I am after 12 weeks of being in Afghanistan.  There are some Abs in there somewhere but they are still hibernating under the protective coating of blubber.

However, in the back of my mind I know that I have not really changed the habits that will at some future time result in my return to the old me.  It is upon this aspect that I have been thinking and that I wanted to write today.  I know that all of us have things in our lives, habits that keep us from realizing our full potential.  Not everyone struggles with weight but this is an allegory of the human condition.  Our spirits can be just as out of shape and flabby as our bodies.  Addictions, pride, anger, laziness, dishonesty are the junk food for our souls.  We feel tired and worn out when our spirits are sick.  We can temper those feelings on a short-term basis by doing a few spiritual sit-ups like reading the scriptures for a few days, doing better at saying our prayers, and putting forth more effort to be aware of where we are.  Much of the time we fall right back into our old habits and things continue like this for years.  What is the solution?  What is the recipe for real change?  I think that the answer to this question is the same for physical and spiritual problems or weaknesses; it is the atonement of Jesus Christ.

The Book of Mormon teaches us that weakness is an invitation to come unto Christ, to recognize our inability to change on our own, to become humble enough to then seek out the Master and only then is the weak thing made strong.  Paul reiterates this teaching in the 12^th chapter of 2 Corinthians.  Paul beseeches the Lord to remove ‘a thorn of the flesh’ but the Lord tells him that His grace is sufficient for him (Paul) and that His (the Lord’s) strength is made perfect “in weakness”.  Paul’s attitude about weakness, infirmity, trial, persecution or distress of any form completely changes as he recognizes that “when I am weak, then am I strong”.  Finally, a modern day apostle, Elder Russell M. Nelson, in the October General Conference said, "We can change our behavior. Our very desires can change.  How?  There is only one way.  True Change--permanent change--can come only through the healing, cleansing, and enabling power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.  He loves you--each of you.  He allows you to access His power as you keep His commandments, eagerly, earnestly, and exactly. It is that simple and certain. The gospel of Jesus Christ is a gospel of change!” 

http://www.lds.org/general-conference/2013/10/decisions-for-eternity?lang=eng

All of our weaknesses or problems are blessings because they are invitations to come unto Christ and be made whole.  Only when we yoke ourselves through covenant with Christ will our burdens, whatever they are, be made light.  I know that this is true.  I have experienced it in my own life and continue to each time I remember to look unto Christ and live.  Self-discipline then goes back to the root of being a disciple of Christ, living as he lived and using His strength where we are weak.  I have proven to myself over a lifetime that I can find temporary success through sheer willpower but in the end the only way to fully, completely, permanently change is through our Savior, Jesus Christ and His mercy and grace.  I think Nephi says it best in 2Nephi 25:23, “. . . for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do.”  All we can do is to surrender ourselves, to approach the altar of God and place upon it our failings, our weaknesses, sin and pride and allow it to be taken from us.  There is no other way.  There isn’t supposed to be another way.

I hope that as each of us begin this new year we will be like Paul, Moroni and Elder Nelson and remember that if you will trust in the power and strength of Christ rather than in yourself you will be permanently changed into new creatures.  I love the Lord.  I am grateful for His incredible goodness.  I love all of you and I am grateful for your unwavering support and love. 

Random pictures from this week

Waiting in line at the post office again.  This time it only took an hour though.  The girl sitting down is Ryan Krampert.  She is one of our anesthesiologists and my night shift buddy.  She is sending home her Gorilla box with all of her stuff cause she is going home! 

Gotta love the post office.

I sent this 60 pound box home.  So far the heaviest box I have shipped.  I cover all boxes with packing tape because inevitably they will get we at some point on their journey back to the states.