My iPod was cleared this weekend – on purpose, due to a hitch with my Nike+ system – and I’ve been painstakingly replacing all the info/settings/log-ins on it for the past two days.    I woke up Monday morning and realized that my long and detailed “to do” list is missing.  As are all my spectacular alarms (I’m a little bit anal…)  At first, I panicked.  Then I realized how freeing that was.   As I listened to the podcasts on my walk this morning, I realized that it was probably the hand of God, helping me on this journey of freedom.  I’ve not tried to replace either one (though I may have to put the laundry alarms back on to avoid backlog there…)

In the podcast Wayne shared how he likes to simply wake up in the morning and ask God what He had planned that day, and how he (Wayne) could participate.  A terrifying prospect for this list-oriented, type-A personality.  It so impacted me, however, that I actually came home, showed the kids the box with their curriculum in it for next year, and simply said that they were free to either follow the assignments I have already programmed into their Google calendar, or they could wake up, journal with God about what He wanted them to accomplish, and send that off to me.  If I believe that what they have written is from God, they are free to do that, instead.  I showed them the box of curriculum that needs to be completed before they can graduate, and I’ve set them free.  (You should probably know that the kids and I have just completed a university-level course on this kind of journaling, and I’ve seen many examples of their journaling, and believe that God truly IS speaking to them already, so I’m not too worried).

How cool is that?  How wonderful to be able to teach my kids to be free to listen to God and follow His leading.  How wonderful to be practicing this myself.

Oh, don’t worry, we’ll all screw up regularly, but it’s a great path to be walking.  SO much freer than lists and obligations.

I’ll keep you posted…

Darlene

Understand me, here, I love to go walking with Tom – we don’t have to talk, I like just being with him.  Sunday’s walk was a real workout though – endurance, mostly, because it’s been ages since I’ve done a long, fast walk, and the first time takes a lot out of me.  We weren’t talking – which is fine on a meandering walk, but deadly for me on a training walk.  I just start to think of how tired I am, and how I want to be somewhere else.

So the new rule is: stroll with hubby, train with iPod.

Whew, I feel better getting that off my chest (don’t worry, I already told Tom, and he gets it – good man, that!)

Happy walking!

Darlene

I started to share about this journey a couple of weeks ago and since then I’ve finished listening to Wayne Jacobsen’s “Transition” series, and am just finishing up his book “He Loves Me! Learning to Live in the Father’s Affection” and I am being deeply challenged, moved, and hugely encouraged.

So much of my faith has been based on religion – not hard to understand when yoou realize I  grew up as a traditional Baptist!

But religion keeps us as far from the heart of God as rebellion.  In fact, I’ll bet God prefers rebellion, because it’s at least usually honest, where religion is not.

Anyway, I’m very grateful for the fact that my training is going to soon be forcing me into longer and longer walks.  It will give me much more time to listen, study, and focus on walking this new path spiritually, while I train for the physical part of my marathon.

Can’t wait to see where it leads…

Happy walking!

Darlene

I received the following in an e-mail .  It’s brilliant!

Recently, in a large city in Australia, a poster featuring a young, thin and tan woman appeared in the window of a gym.  It said, “This summer, do you want to be a mermaid or a whale?“

A middle-aged woman, whose physical characteristics did not match those of the woman on the poster,
responded publicly to the question posed by the gym.

“To Whom It May Concern,

Whales are always surrounded by friends (dolphins, sea lions, curious humans.) They have an active sex life,
get pregnant and have adorable baby whales. They have a wonderful time with dolphins stuffing themselves with shrimp. They play and swim in the seas, seeing wonderful places like Patagonia , the Bering Sea and the coral reefs of Polynesia.

Whales are wonderful singers and have even recorded CDs. They are incredible creatures and virtually have no predators other than humans. They are loved, protected and admired by almost everyone in the world.

Mermaids don’t exist. If they did exist, they would be lining up outside the offices of Argentinean psychoanalysts due to identity crisis. Fish or human?

They don’t have a sex life because they kill men who get close to them, not to mention how could they have sex? Just look at them … where is IT? Therefore, they don’t have kids either. Not to mention, who wants to get close to a girl who smells like a fish store?

The choice is perfectly clear to me:
I want to be a whale.

P..S. We are in an age when media puts into our heads the idea that only skinny people are beautiful, but I prefer to enjoy an ice cream with my kids, a good dinner with a man who makes me shiver, and a piece of chocolate with my friends.

With time, we gain weight because we accumulate so much information and wisdom in our heads that when there is no more room, it distributes out to the rest of our bodies.

So we aren’t heavy, we are enormously cultured, educated and happy.

Beginning today, when I look at my butt in the mirror I will think, “Good grief, look how smart I am!”

Happy Walking!
Darlene

With the Frostbite, I’ve had to switch to something different when the temperatures are below 0°C to prevent frostbite from happening again, but I’m not happy about it.  This is the case at least until Vibram gets caught up with their world-wide back orders.  They do have winter shoes, but none in stock in my size anywhere in the world, apparently.

Everyone thinks you need all this cushioning and support for your feet.  The research now shows that the more you pay for your shoes, the more likely you are to be injured.  When you buy shoes – especially for exercise – the rule of thumb is, “the less the better” if you want strong feet, and if you want to avoid injury.

According to the Vibram site:

The typical human foot is an anatomical marvel of evolution with 26 bones, 33 joints, 20 muscles, and hundreds of sensory receptors, tendons and ligaments. Like the rest of the body, to keep our feet healthy, they need to be stimulated and exercised.

That’s why we recommend wearing FiveFingers for exercise, play, and for fun. Stimulating the muscles in your feet and lower legs will not only make you stronger and healthier, it improves your balance, agility and proprioception.

Want more information on getting the best shoes for your feet?  Check out this excellent article

Still not convinced?  Read this: Athletic Shoes & Supports: Facts & Myths

Want to risk trying the Vibram Five Finger shoes?  Get them here -but you’ll probably have to wait until Spring.  Sigh.

Happy Walking!

Darlene

I like to “collect” prayers to use in different situations.  Of course, you don’t need special words or phrases to get God’s attention, but sometimes I need them to get MY attention focused in the right place.

I’ve been reading a series of books lately by a woman named Liberty Savard and I have been really blessed by some of her teaching on prayer.  I took some of her suggestions and created a breath-prayer exercise for the beginning of my walking.  I thought I’d post it here in case you’d like to use it, too:

1. As you inhale slowly, pray “I bind myself to God’s truth, authenticity and integrity“ – and really visualize yourself “inhaling Christ” as it were. Pause for a brief second or two and then
2. Exhale and pray “I loose myself from all falsehood, lies, and deception” and imagine those things leaving your body. Pause.
3. Inhale and pray “I bind my will, passions, and purposes, to the will, passions and purposes of God” visualizing yourself inhaling these properties. Pause.
4. Exhale and pray “I loose myself from false pretensions, selfishness, greed, and fear” and exhale those things from your life. Pause.
5. Inhale and pray “I bind my mind to the mind of Christ, to hear the thoughts, intents, and purposes of His heart ”. Pause.
6. Exhale and and pray, “I loose myself from wrong thinking, behaviour, and attitudes”. Pause.
7. Inhale and pray “I bind my feet to God’s path for me, and my hands to the special work He’s ordained for me to accomplish in His Kingdom”. Pause.
8. Exhale and pray “I loose myself from the strongholds of unmet needs, unresolved issues, and unhealed hurts”. Pause.

I have a feeling that a prayer like that throughout your day could vastly change the way you see things!

Happy walking!

Darlene

(PS – don’t you think that picture looks just like me?  LOL!  I don’t know who owns it, but it’s pretty cool!)

Well a friend of mine is in to Essential Oils and gave me some Helichrysum Italicum to massage into my toes to see if the feeling comes back.  The good news is that my toes – all except for the very tip of my left big toe – have their feeling back, and are functioning as normal.   The problem seems to be that the frostbite created a very thick layer of dead skin around the tips and bottom of my toes that wasn’t really visible – it looked completely normal.  The massaging removed that, and now all is well.

Whew!

I still have to be careful in the future to not allow my feet to get cold, but my new “Post Frostbite Kit” seems to be keeping all the cold away completely.

Today I get to start back in to my full training program again.  This is a happy lady!

Darlene

I was born into the church. I could probably count on one hand how many Sunday morning (now Saturday night) services I’ve missed in my almost half a decade. Add to that all the Sunday evening services back when they were part of the “routine” and untold hours of volunteering as a Sunday School teacher for all ages, a youth leader, a musician, etc., I’ve spent probably half my life in some kind of religious setting. I’ve participated in everything from very high latin catholic masses to “no rules” Charismatic frenzies; I’ve been to church in dozens of countries, in several languages, and I’ve even been a missionary. I love the church. I love the lifestyle, the people, the teaching, the music. I love being a part of something that matters.

The truth is, however, that while I take my faith very seriously, and while I’ve striven most of my life to serve God faithfully, some nagging feeling in my gut is telling me that somehow, I’ve “missed the point”. For such a long time I’ve felt “stuck”. Way back in my missionary days half a lifetime ago I met a God who was actively involved in my every day. Everything I was asked to do was so far beyond my capabilities, it was literally “trust God or screw up beyond redemption”. I had no idea how to do that, but I learned quickly – on the job. And God showed up, BIG. I began a relationship with Him that had vibrance, joy, passion, delight, and lots of surprises.

Now, living in a safe city, with a wonderful husband who provides well, two kids with no issues whatsoever, and pretty much able to have/be/do anything my little heart desires, I feel so far from God and who He revealed Himself to be all those years ago. I’m in such a “safe place” that my need for God seems minimal.

And yet, I’m so hungry for Him.

A couple of months ago, in an attempt to help my husband who’s having much the same struggle, I bought the book “So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore” by Wayne Jacobsen and Dave Coleman. A fictional book that really challenged the way I saw church and what it meant.

You see, most of my Christian upbringing has been about duty and behaviour: how often I attend church, how much I read the Bible, how well I memorize scripture, how many people I win to the Lord, how many hours I spend in volunteer ministry, etc. It has little, if anything, to do with relationship – either with my fellow man or with God Himself. And yet, isn’t the Bible just one long story of God’s heart longing for relationship with His people?

Somewhere we’ve allowed this to degenerate into a guilt fest – we are constantly checking to see how well we measure up. How much more we can add to our list of accomplishments. How squeaky clean we can make ourselves.

Through my walking and listening, I’m learning about a whole new way of living out my faith. Jacobsen’s book led me to his website which in turn has led me to some more teaching about transitioning out of the guilt of the religious mindset.  In other words, how to be a Christian without being religious.

I’m deeply challenged by what I’m hearing.  I’m seeking God’s heart to learn how to move forward here – or not.

Wherever this takes me, it’s bound to be an interesting journey! 

I’ll keep you posted.

Happy Walking

Darlene

First of all, there seems to be some permanent damage – especially in the fourth toe on my left foot – the one that went gray.    Dead as a doornail, that one.  The rest are tingly at the tips, some are still a little tender, but not bad.  Yesterday I was able to wear my normal shoes without pain, though, so that was great.

Last night I visited some “new” friends – well, I was actually his Gr. 12 prom date, and haven’t seen him since… I found him on Facebook, connected with his brilliant wife – who seems to be my twin separated from me at birth – and she’s into Essential Oils.  Last night while we visited at their lovely country home, Sue offered to massage my feet with some Essential Oils (not many people have offered to massage my feet EVER, let alone after knowing me for fewer than 12 hours…).  This morning my toes felt irritated more than usual, which gives me hope that this oil mix/massage might be waking up some of those dead nerves.  We’ll see what happens over the next few days.

I saw the doctor on Friday and he made it clear that I must now be extremely cautious for the rest of my life as I am now 10x more likely to get frostbite again.  As someone who has freezing feet even at the height of summer, I felt somewhat doomed by that statement, and knew I had to re-think winter walking.

SO…

Today my most-generous-of-all-wonderful-husbands drove me down to Gord’s Running Store to check out some different options.  The problem is that Vibrams strengthen all the foot muscles and allow your feet to work the way they were designed to.  “Normal” running shoes don’t – they support everything to the point that the muscles in your feet atrophy, and no longer work the way they were designed to work.  By switching between the two you end up living in a place where you go from body-builder to wheelchair-bound and back again – at least as far as your feet are concerned.  WAAAAY too much work!

I explained my dilemma to the incredibly helpful saleswoman, and told her I don’t want to spend six weeks during the peak training season re-strengthening my feet when the snow goes and the temperature warms up, and I can be back in my Vibrams.

She directed me to Biom Shoes.  You have to sacrifice your first born to afford them (Simon’s a good kid, he won’t mind…) but they apparently encourage natural motion in your foot and they keep the foot muscles strong. Not everyone believes they achieve that, but my options are limited at this point in time.

Knowing that the real key is keeping my feet warm at all times, I bought the shoe two sizes too big after trying them on with double socks – one very thick hiking sock and a standard fitness sock – and insoles, because I’m also going to be investing in thermal insoles.

While I was there I got two pairs of Injinji Outdoor socks made with micro-fine Merino wool to make sure my toes don’t rub together and get lesions that get infected without me knowing it (when your toes are numb, you don’t know there’s a problem…) and also to keep my feet warm, as Merino wool is “excellent at regulating body temperature, especially when worn against the skin. The wool provides some warmth, without overheating the wearer. It draws moisture (sweat) away from the skin, a phenomenon known as wicking. The fabric is slightly moisture repellent (keratin fibers are hydrophobic at one end and hydrophillic at the other), allowing the user to avoid the feeling of wetness” (according to Wikipedia)  And, of course, I can wear these in cooler Spring/Autumn temperatures in my Vibrams and still keep my tootsies warm.

Finally I got some ice-grips.  A few close calls made me realize that adding a numb head to numb toes would make walking impossible (though I’m sure many of you think the head’s already numb…) so I decided to not take any chances.

And there went the second child – thanks, Tina!  LOL!

So now I have cool gear on my feet to keep the toes toasty, I’m all set to go!   I’m breaking in the new shoes over this weekend, and I’ll do an easy 1 hour on Monday to test them out.

Wish me luck!

Darlene

(PS – who was it who said that walking is a very inexpensive sport?)

(PS – and never fear! I’ll be back in my beloved Vibrams once the temperatures are above 10˚C!)

(PPS – Oh, and just kidding there about exchanging my kids for cool gear.   The kids are here and safe…)

As usual, my toes got pretty cold when I started out, but I knew that once I hit training speed, they’d warm up and be fine. Or, so I thought. Yesterday was a “ladder” walk, a kind of Interval walk where you jump around into different heart rate zones, several of which are quite slow. At times my feet felt fine. Other times, my toes were quite cold, but not painfully so.

On the way home, however, I began to feel quite uncomfortable and about 1km from home, when I should have been in HR Zone 2 (HR in the mid-90’s) I just kept it up in HR Zone 5 (HR in the mid 130’s) because my right foot felt numb, and both feet were feeling uncomfortable.

I got home and found a hot meal waiting for me, so I peeled off my shoes and snow gear, and sat down to eat. My feet began to thaw over lunch, but my toes were still numb. After lunch and a cup of tea I finally got my socks off – and realized how wet they were. I looked at my feet and discovered 3 toes were an odd grey-colour, and all my toes were bright red. One was swollen. My feet, however, were very warm.

It was then I realized I had frostbite.

Thankfully it wasn’t really serious frostbite, but I quickly did some research to treat my feet to make sure I didn’t damage them further.

Following instructions to continue to keep them warm and dry, I had a quick, not-too-warm shower, put on clean Injinji socks to keep the toes separated, wrapped those in fuzzy warm socks, and then slipped on my hut booties. Feet were toasty, but as the toes began to heal, the pain started. By dinner time I could no longer walk – it felt like a 200lb someone was standing on my bare toes with work boots on. There was no place to “put” my feet. No place brought release – raised, down, with weight on them, without weight. The only relief came from walking so I walked around the dining room table for about 40 minutes trying to cope with the pain. I have no idea what serious frostbite feels like, but if this is mild, I never want to find out.

Finally at about 6:30 I took some ibuprofen and crawled into bed. It was after 7:00 before I could tolerate covers.

This morning I’m still in quite a bit of pain, but it’s tolerable. I don’t walk too well, but at least it’s not excruciating when I just sit. Toes feel like they’re soaking in “too hot” water.

The real dilemma is, where do I go from here? Looks like new VFF’s won’t be ready before March (!!). I don’t have any shoes to walk in other than my regular day shoes which will get totally wrecked in the snow and salt outside. Do I pay $160 for shoes that will “do me” until the VFF’s are back in stock?  I do have my Sketcher’s (which I stopped wearing almost right away because they “re-activated” an ankle issue I used to have), but with the lack of feedback from the thick soles and the rocking soles on sheer ice, I’m liable to end up in the hospital with a concussion wearing those.

ARGH.

Well, one thing is for sure – no walking this week! I’m not sure what I’ll do with all that extra time…

Darlene