(This is going out a little early, as our Internet is being shut off in preparation for our trip. Enjoy!)

I hope you had a great week trying out some of the challenges I’ve been listing. Did you manage any or all of the training steps? Post your reaction below, and share with us your trials and triumphs. I would love to hear from you!

We’ve worked through two weeks so far, and I hope it’s been easy to fit these suggestions into your day and create new habits. Let’s look ahead to week number 3. Remember these assignments all start on Monday so you have the weekend to get yourself “kitted out” and “psyched up”:

1. Equipment Needs: Nothing new this week.

2. The Spiritual Challenge: Keep working through “The Epic“, but look for ways where you can sense God’s presence in the things you take great joy in. See my post on Joy if you don’t understand what I mean!

3. Nutritional Focus: Water – yep still working on it! This is a MAJOR KEY to your overall health. This week drink a glass of water while you prepare your daily meals/snacks, in addition to the water you drink in the morning.

If all this water is discouraging you, take time to explore this site

4. The Exercise Program: We’re going to continue to increase our daily steps and focus on posture, and this week we’re going to add some “designated walking times”, which means we are going to start actually going for short walks. We will have trouble increasing our steps much more without them

So that’s next week’s training plan. If you’ve done even some of it so far, please reward yourself with something special – a new book, some great walking music, cool socks for your walking times, or whatever else tickles your fancy. Try to not make it food-related as that can cause problems we don’t want to have to fix!

Post your results, struggles, triumphs and questions below!

Happy Walking!

Darlene

Well, how did you do this week? Did you manage any or all of the training steps? Post your reaction below, and share with us your trials and triumphs. Let’s spur each other on to greater things!

Week one is behind us, so let’s look ahead to week 2. Remember these assignments all start on Monday so you have the weekend to get yourself “kitted out” and “psyched up”:

1. Equipment Needs: See last week for basic equipment, and this week add a timer, either a watch that beeps on the hour, or some other kind of timer.

2. The Spiritual Challenge: The big key with spiritual growth is making sure you’re on the right track in the first place. I love this quote by John Eldredge:

Life, for most of us, feels like a movie we’ve arrived to forty minutes late.

Sure, good things happen, sometimes beautiful things. But tragic things happen, too. What does
it mean? We find ourselves in the middle of a story that is sometimes wonderful, sometimes awful, usually a confusing mixture of both, and we haven’t a clue how to make sense of it all.
No wonder we keep losing heart.

We need to know the rest of the story.

For when we were born, we were born into the midst of a great story begun before the dawn of time. A story of adventure, of risk and loss, heroism, …and betrayal. A story where good is warring against evil, danger lurks around every corner, and glorious deeds wait to be done. Think of all those stories you’ve ever loved – there’s a reason they stirred your heart. They’ve been trying to tell you about the true Epic ever since you were young.

There is a Larger Story. And you have a crucial role to play.

That’s what our Spiritual walk is all about. Understanding the Larger Story and what our role is, in it. John’s book “The Epic” is the best book I’ve ever read on that story. Your Spiritual homework this week is to read it, listen to it, or watch it. It’s a pretty small book, but it will be hard to put down, I promise, and it will probably change the way you see everything.

3. Nutritional Focus: Water

• Now fill your water bottle up full. In the morning drink half before you get out of bed, and drink the other half before you leave your bedroom, to get ready for the day.

4. The Exercise Program: We’re going to continue to increase our daily steps, but this week we’re going to put our focus on our posture, as well.

And there you have it – very manageable tasks for each day of next week. Get your equipment together over the weekend, and off you go!

Post your results, struggles, triumphs and questions below!

Happy Walking!

Darlene