Running in Bulgaria
I have known a lot of runners in my short life. At random points in my life, I even claimed myself to be pseudo runner. Honestly, I do not believe I ever met anyone specifically who claimed to love running, though. It was always a, sort of, thing that they did either because it was ingrained in them or they had to for various different reasons. That all changed when I spent my summer in Bulgaria with a woman named Britney Sue.
Britney Sue, or B-Sue as she affectionately became known to others (and Mama Duck to our group of three that traveled with her), was one of those who saw a physical challenge and tackled it, head on. The story of how I ended up in Bulgaria is a long one, and one that will have to be saved for another time. However, I do not believe I would be able to begin this blog without at least mentioning one of the most inspirational beings I know on this planet.
B-Sue was about a year or two older than me, and assigned as my team leader for this internship with New Mission Systems International for my internship working with Gabe and Melissa Hillman in Velingrad, Bulgaria doing outdoor recreation. Prior to leaving for this internship, I was to meet with B-Sue via Skype to get to know one another. At the time I was in the midst of a lot of personal struggles, specifically with an eating disorder and anxiety. I didn’t have a personal vendetta against B-Sue…but I was afraid of her. I was terrified that she would quickly recognize my falling apart at the seams; that I was not equipped to do this work that I so desperately wanted and felt called to do.
During our first one on one skype session, I had to go to the prayer room of my campus ministry to use their internet. I was sitting next to a window overlooking the side yard and my house that I was living in at the time, which was across the lot. There was a sunny spring glow coming into the prayer room and I was surrounded my written and crafted prayers by so many others than had used this room before me. It was a light blue color. I wished desperately that my emotion at the time reflected the day, but in reality I was abysmal and preparing myself for B-Sue to say they wouldn’t be able to handle me for the internship, that I would be too much, that I wasn’t worth it.
I scraped the surface with the beautiful girl in the computer and she met me in my brokenness.
For about two and a half months, B-Sue and I shared a bedroom that had a queen sized bed on one wall and three twin beds lining the opposite wall. The wall adjacent to both of these walls, had a door that led to a small balcony. Most mornings, long before I awoke, B-Sue would go for a run. By the time I stirred, she was back and reading her bible on the balcony. She would sit with her café s’milako from the local coffee shop (which all the baristas knew our order upon our entering their establishment) and read and write. I believe that, if left undisturbed, she would have sit there, breathing in the village, devouring thin pages of her Bible and writing love letters of devotion to God.
I, being the night owl that I am, envied her embrace of the early morning. However, what I could not understand is her yearn to run almost every day. Not only that, but the joy she had after she ran. What kind of strange human would go out of her way to wake up earlier than need be, exert even more energy and be stared at by strangers as she jogged by them? It’s true—I never saw anyone going for a run outside. She was well recognized for it.
I will never forget the one day she returned from her run, slightly frantic, telling me she had been chased by a pack of wild dogs. Somehow she managed to outrun the dogs, but apparently, we found later, it is dangerous to try and outrun them. But that is B-Sue. At every challenge, she seems to out run it, with the most joy I have ever seen in another human being. We would be on our bikes facing a street going up at what seemed to be a 85 degree incline and there would be B-Sue at the head of the pack straining every ounce of her being to get to the top.
When I left that summer, B-Sue challenged me to see exercise as a place of worship as she has found it to be a beautiful meeting place with God. Instead of dwelling on how much I was hurting in my life, I needed to give focus to the fact that I have the capabilities of doing what I am doing, here and now. By using my physical body as a prayer to God I have the chance to let go of the pain I have carried for so long.
What is something someone in your life challenged you to do? Have you actually tried it?
“Breathe in, ‘Our Father, Who art in Heaven…’ breath out, ‘Hallowed by thy name…’ breathe in, ‘Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done…’ breathe out. How long have I been in the water? It seems like ten hours…it has only been 45 seconds. Awesome. Okay. Here we go.”
One mile of laps in the pool, while reciting the Lord’s Prayer at least 100 times and I finished. You see, I am not the best at praying, especially when I am exerting some sort of physical energy that is cutting off my oxygen supply. So, I resort to prayers and Scripture I know. To be honest, that is how I ended up memorizing The Lord’s Prayer, because I couldn’t take a copy of it with me in the pool (and because I didn’t have the stamina to make one up of my own).
At the end of my time in Bulgaria, B-Sue gave me this assignment to write myself a letter with my prayers and goals for the upcoming year. I had done things like this before, but never took it seriously to heart. I meant to write things down but it was too overwhelming and I would have much rather have spent my time with friends that I wouldn’t see again for a long while. Instead, this time, I wanted it to stick. I wanted to write something meaningful to myself.
I scraped the surface with the beautiful girl in the computer and she met me in my brokenness.
My note was not was not anything long or complicated. It was, more or less, a list of things I was hoping to accomplish. Prayers and dreams I feared I wouldn’t accomplish, so I tried to play off as not a big deal, even though it was. Over time, I forgot what I had written. My life continued. I got dragged into the insanity of school, as it was my senior year of college.
Then, one day I got a letter in the mail with very familiar handwriting. My letter had finally come and I was nervous to open it. I went upstairs to my bedroom in the attic and sat on my mattress that rested on the floor. I opened it and saw a simple list of about five things. Number one was finding exercise as a form of worship. Did I do what I planned? I thought back to my time since coming home to the States and couldn’t seem to pinpoint if and when I accomplished this goal.
My mind quickly shifted back to my nights in Bulgaria. Every night, just as B-Sue spent her mornings on the balcony, I spent my nights on the same balcony. I looked out at the city. And breathed. And stretched. And yearned for the people I had met and those I had not. And breathed. And stretched. And thought of the moments of the day that had passed. And breathed. And stretched. And thought to identify God in each of my teammates and students. And breathed….and stretched….and laid down to look at the stars. The same stars every night, recognizing the individual constellations.
Years later, I am in a hot yoga class; claiming my usual extreme left back corner of the room to go as unnoticed as possible, a cross stationed right in front of me next to the end of the giant mirror. That is my focus. My class is finished before I realize it. My muscles ache and sweat is dripping from my nose, but my breathing is smooth, I feel new. I feel alive, the overwhelming stress of life at least momentarily taken from me and I thank God for this body that I never have been thankful for before.
You see, it wasn’t this extra or complicated act of meeting with God while I worked out. Instead it was purely recognizing God in the midst of something I used to abuse; allowing God to reclaim me, to shape me into something new time after time.
Now it is your turn. Take time to think about how you have been deconstructed over time and rebuilt. Share your stories. What has God reclaimed in your life or something you want to witness God reclaim?
Isaiah 43:18-19
