When Sitting Still Looks Like Running

Sometimes you need a moment to sit still. 

Healing is like that. 

I haven’t really shared much the last few years. I was focusing on my health and a healthy pregnancy. Overcoming fear, trusting the Lord, learning to rely on others. Too much to unpack here.

Since last time, among other things, we welcomed our fourth child. Which  means we have a 16-year space between youngest and newest. What a joyous whirlwind.

As things began to straighten out and settle it was time to find quiet, rebalance, and walk the pace of Grace. I started to recognize that I was losing capacity after such a season of intention and stretching. It was time to pull back and rest.

Slowly, I let my calendar empty without refilling it but soon found myself fidgeting and pacing. Unlearning the hectic pace of striving is not a one day task. It was a deeply ingrained habit that needed to be slowly unraveled. I invited the Lord to teach me this thing, again. If you search my blog pages you will find at the very beginning that I was trying to learn to not be so busy. You’ll find it in the middle too. We all have those hard wrestles that take time to surrender. This is one of mine. 

So when I asked the Lord again, “How do I stop the striving and rest,” He didn’t scold me or give me a “You should have heard me the first time,” answer. 

He invited me to run. Not just across the yard. A half-marathon. He planted the idea and without me saying a word confirmed it through half a dozen outside sources over the next week or two.

It might have been awareness of the word “running” but the number of times that it came up specifically was uncanny. I asked for very clear confirmation and the next day, I turned on a podcast that began with this line, “When I run, I hear the Lord speak clearly.” Thank you Christine Caine! (Equip and Empower podcast)

So, with the best attitude I could manage, I started a training program. 

I jogged (walked slowly with an occasional jogging like movement) twice a week and stretched and built my strength as I searched for a half-marathon 20 weeks away. 

As if I needed further confirmation— there was a race exactly 20 weeks away in a cool part of the state. 

Temperature is a thing for me. I don’t jog pretty. There are no magazine covers that would want me when I exercise. I am splotchy, red faced and sweaty. My hair plasters to my head, my glasses fall off and I look drowned and overheated all at once. So the cooler temperature was one of my requests. 

One day after a short run, a friend asked if she could come with me. I was certain she meant once or twice or in theory to encourage me. To my surprise she actually wanted to start a more regular habit of running, and she was excited by the idea of a half-marathon!

So we were set. We were running a half marathon in 20 weeks. 

As we trained I had to consistently remind myself to be aware of my body and its limitations. It was still healing postpartum and it was easy to over-do it without thinking. I questioned whether this was a good idea at all for healing my body or my heart. It was so hard. It was hard to bundle up the baby and get myself out the door, and hard to push through the first ½ mile. It was hard to keep going, and hard to keep my posture correct and hard to not over-think. How on earth was this healing? I trusted Him but I did not understand.

Healing doesn’t always mean staying completely still. It is done with intention. 

Physically, when we get injured, we clean, bandage and protect the wound while it heals. 

We care for it continually—changing the dressing and carefully applying medicine and salves to keep it clean and promote healing. Some wounds require regular movement to keep flexibility and strength and some require a cast and complete stillness. 

Emotions are the same way, even though we don’t give them the same attention.

When we damage our hearts we can be quick to cover it up and hide the damage. Band-aid the issue and keep moving, keep working. 

We can easily neglect to clean it, bandage it or protect it. We sometimes do our best to pretend the wound never happened at all. 

When we finally stop ignoring, we are shocked to see the emotional wounds we thought were healed. This was me. The newborn stage and my empty calendar meant I had a lot of time to sit with myself. I found that in trying to be still, I could feel every emotional wound I had been covering up. It was too much. 

I was tired physically, emotionally and out of ideas. Reluctantly, I took my old and new wounds to Him, and surrendered to His healing ways.

What I didn’t know when I started this physical rehab and emotional healing process was that there was energy behind the negative emotions and it had to go somewhere. 

But He knew. And He asked me to run.

He knew that I needed to be running as I processed and release that energy somewhere positive. I would need the days off to feel sore muscles stretch. To push through on days when staying home would have been my preference. 

He knew that to confront my deep self-rejection and bitterness, I would need a lot of time by myself and a place to release the anxiety.

The Lord knew exactly what I needed to find my strength in Him. He knew how to heal the rift between my mind and body. He knew how to help me release my self-judgement and allow me to soak up the sunlight of Grace and He gave me the gift of a friend to do the healing with. 

In the middle of the difficult and painful it can be hard to hear soft invitations to still, heal, or dig deep. So often we just ignore Holy Spirit’s promptings to something we feel is silly and unimportant. 

Who else would decide that running in a season of stepping-back was the best way to learn?

“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.” —Isaiah 55:8 (ESV)

We can trust Him to lead us back to healing and rest and all of the rest of it. He knows where our hearts are. 

It’s okay if you’ve been angry and hurt. He understands that you’ve been protecting your own heart because you feel like no one else is trustworthy. It’s okay. 

It’s okay too if it’s Him you’re angry with. David had all the emotions and was still known as a “man after God’s own heart.” 

It’s okay if you have just realized that you’re on the same lesson you started with. It’s about pressing forward.

Keep seeking, listening, being still. Keep asking the questions. Then rest and wait, He won’t ignore you. 

He might ask you to run.