Pouring My Heart Out-Very Long Read

[mommymatriarch]

I haven't commented in a while. I've been super busy it seems, not to mention just getting over food poisoning and a stomach bug 1.5 weeks apart. Yuck. But I came across this article that I wrote about 2 years ago. I used it for a blog I was starting up, but never went 100% into the blog so I put it aside. This may come across at first that I am pointing fingers and saying "you need to get it together." But what you must understand first is this..I wrote this article to myself. You'll read later on case #1 and case #2. I admit to you that I was case #1 for many years. And still today I can feel that way. I don't always have my mess together, but in a dark place in my life a couple of years ago, I decided no more would I allow myself to feel not good enough. So I wrote this article one night when I couldn't sleep. It has some religious references, but I urge you to read it regardless. Something might strike a cord with you. If not, maybe you know someone else who could benefit from reading this. Regardless, I am putting myself out there for all of you to see where I've been and now I can say I am so much stronger. (please excuse any grammatical errors)

Is Your Heart Still Beating? 


Put everything aside. Whatever else has your attention, let it go. If you are multitasking, stop. If you are eating a meal or a snack, put it away. I mean it when I say that I want your undivided attention. Why? Because your heart is at stake.
Pause for a moment, and take a deep breath. Exhale, and place your hand over your chest. Close you eyes and feel for your heart’s steady pulse. Is your heart still beating? Remove any thoughts from your mind. Release it all from your body, and let go of all tension from work, school, kids or any pressure that you are under. Just breathe….

There are often times, that we forget to check our pulse. Yes, as long as we’re breathing and moving we know that we are alive and everything is fine. But what if we are not okay? What if what we feel seems like normal to us, but we are truly missing out on what our full potential is. To focus on the issues of women in particular, there are things on this earth that make our inner being feel out of line. There is the pressure to be successful, the pressure to be liked by our peers and find that loving husband or mate, the pressure to have a good paying job to support our families, the pressure to raise our children right, and the pressure to look good to everyone around us. Whether we like to admit it or not, we feel those issues pressing up against us at some point or another.

We powerful women like to shrug off that fact that our inner being might not be 100 percent, but as long as we are still able to move and get the job done, that is enough for us. But why not let your heart truly beat for once. Not just your physical heart, but your spiritual heart. It is known that not everyone claims or wants to be very religious, but more and more people have made the statement that although they may not be religious, they believe that there is something spiritual to their life. So whether you are a follower of God or believe in some sort of higher being, this can apply to you.

Let's be real and admit that we like to ignore our feelings if it means going on with life. We like normalcy and if blurting out our deepest darkest feelings means controversy, we would rather keep them to ourselves. It is important for us to be portrayed as strong and not moving, because in this day and time, we may not always have a man or family to lean on. What we don’t realize is that the more we try to suppress our feelings, the more our spiritual heartbeat slows down. It can then slow down to the point of a break down. Why do we allow ourselves to get this way? Why is it so hard sometimes to figure out where our inner grief is coming from? Fit at Heart is about answering those questions. So many times we accept that the way that we feel is how it is, and there is no way around it. The concept of Fit at Heart is that having an unhealthy spiritual heart can lead to an unhealthy body whether it be physically, mentally or emotionally. Just as you physical heart pumps life into your body, your spiritual heart pumps life into your spirit.
When asked a given person on what comes to mind when they hear the word heart, most would say they think of their inner being rather than their physical organ. Why is this so? Because your heart is the source and dwelling of everything about you. It is your knowledge, will, understanding, passions, desires, thoughts, appetites, affections, purposes, and endeavors. All of those things are deep within you and your spiritual heart.

We women like to put on a front that everything in our world is as it should be by what we say, what we look like, or how we act. But God says that none of that matters. Peter points this out in 1 Peter:

“Your adornment must not merely be external-braiding the hair, and wearing gold jewelry, or putting on dresses; but let is be the hidden person of the heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is precious in the sight of God.
-1 Peter 3: 3-4

Isn’t that interesting? Peter says that our hearts contain an inner person. So within every one of us, there are two people.
*The person that everyone sees and knows.
*The hidden person that only you can see.

With that in mind, let us clarify the definition of the spiritual heart: Your spiritual heart is the TRUE YOU.
The definition of a spiritual heart is the reason behind why it is so important to be fit at heart. When it comes to lacking an ultimate fit heart you might be 1 of 2 cases:

Case 1: Your outer being is portrayed to others as someone who takes care of herself. You may be seen as a healthy eater who cooks beautiful meals using only the freshest foods. You may be seen as the wife or girlfriend who is active and is always working out her body. You may be seen as the mother who has it completely together for her child. You might seem like the most innovative person with the brightest future. Yet if people praise you for all the great qualities that you display on the outside, why do you:

* feel that you’re not eating healthy enough?
*feel that you are not good enough for your boyfriend or husband?
*feel that some days it’s not worth the work of being a mother?
*feel that you should be smarter?
*feel that binge eating is the only way to cope with the stresses of this world?
*feel that you should skip a meal because you are not skinny enough?

Or as most women in this area are dealing with on a daily basis, why do you look at yourself in the mirror completely disgusted with your body because you believe it does not compare to somebody else?
Therefore in case 1, why do you allow your inner feelings to get you to do things that completely go against what everybody praises you about? It is because in this incident, your unhealthy spiritual heart has caused you an unhealthy mind. Which also can possibly lead to an unhealthy body.

Case 2: Your outer being might be portrayed to others as someone who is extremely unhealthy or overweight. People judge you by your appearance and do not take the chance to get to know the real you. People see you as a person who is physically unable to do much of anything, therefore they do not ask you to be involved. They assume that you have made the ultimate choice to live an unhealthy life and that you don’t care. Therefore, if people have the wrong perception of you and put you down because of your outer self Why do you:

*feel that you cannot get motivated to get healthy because something or someone has hurt you in the past?
*feel that getting healthy will not change the fact of how people perceive you?
*feel that no one cares to get to know the real you?

Or as so many women are struggling with in this area, why do you feel that you are already so far off the deep end that it’s not worth trying to change your lifestyle now?

Finally in case 2, why do you allow your inner feelings to keep you from radiating your inner self to your outer self by getting healthy? Because in this incident, your unhealthy spiritual heart causes you to have an unhealthy physical body.

In both cases, the question to ask is: If relating to those feelings makes my heart spiritually unhealthy, how does my heart become spiritually fit?

Before we answer that, keep in mind that so many of us women do not want to admit that our heart might be lacking. We can’t afford for a weak heart because we’ve got too many things going on in our life. Acknowledging that our heart could be stronger and trying to fix it will only take time and time is something that we don’t have. So, we’d rather run on 50-80% most of the time to get us through the day. Life happens right? We’re not meant to have strong hearts all of the time. Says who? It is true that the stresses of life can come our way daily and those stresses can make our hearts weak? But who says that we have to let that weakness stay and make a home in our spiritual hearts? Who says we cannot develop strong enough hearts to combat anything and everything that comes our way, to the point of when things go wrong, when negative thinking begins, we know exactly the right way to attack the situation and come out victorious. Who says we can’t? NO ONE.

Your heart is your own and it belongs to you. Your heart is your life, and your life is your heart. It is up to you to take care of it and to guard it.
Proverbs 4:23 says:
“Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life.”

If God created us in his own image, then shouldn’t our heart reflect God’s heart as well? What people saw in Jesus’ outer self was exactly what was in his inner self. Therefore, we have the capability of developing our hearts to be like Jesus because we are created in the image of God. We have the power to have our outer self be seen by others as successful, healthy, complete and have that also reflect on our inside. Yet, the question remains, did you relate to any of those feelings listed above? If so, where is your heart at this very moment? How unhealthy is it? How can you know for sure? How can my heart reach it’s full potential?

We must first go to the center of our being and become Aware. Now what does it mean to be aware of one's self? It means to strip of the layers, take off the mask and truly look deep inside yourself. Stop being the person you believe people think you should be and ask yourself, am I okay? Am I truly running on 90-100% like people think I am, or am I closer to hitting ground zero at any moment. That is something we women struggle with. We sometimes are not even aware just how close we are to a breaking point until we have a 90 second warning and all chaos breaks lose. We then crash and burn, we say hurtful things we don't mean to the people we love and we then isolate ourselves from the world because we're ashamed that we couldn't hold it together.

So I challenge you today to reassess your heart and become aware of where you're at. Are you case #1? Do people praise you for being so fit and healthy and a hard worker and a great wife or mother, yet you still don't think you're enough? Or are you case #2? Are you on that journey to losing a good amount of weight, yet people look at you as if you're doing nothing because you're still a bigger size? And do you then allow those people to make you feel like it's not worth the effort to keep working hard on your healthy lifestyle journey? If you apply to any of these let me assure you of one thing:

If you do not become of aware and fix what is within first, you will never be satisfied with yourself no matter how in shape or out of shape you may be. Whether you are dealing with resentment of something someone has done to you in the past, guilt over something you did to a loved one, or just plain disgusted with the way that you look, I urge you to stand before God, or whomever your higher being is and LET IT GO. 

David stood before God in Psalm 51 after he knew he had done so much wrong in his life. He became aware of his heart and knew he could not go on any longer. He said to God:

"Create in me a heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit in me." 

So I urge you ladies, no matter what you are going through, in order to be fit on the outside, you must first be fit on the inside. Or you will never be good enough for not the people of this world, but good enough for yourself. And that is what truly matters. 
 

[thom]

Hope you're fully recovered from the food poisoning & flu. No fun at all. I like the verses you share. We are all definitely on a journey facing our own struggles, many of them known only to us. Best to you as you work through things.