Putting On My Oxygen Mask

I’ve done a fair amount of flying lately, including our most recent trip to a conference in Orlando. The flight attendant always instructs us that, in the unlikely event of loss of cabin pressure, we are to put on our own oxygen masks before we help someone else. Most people are busy reading or sending off a last-minute text message and pay no attention to any of the instructions, but I wonder how many of them - us - would wish we’d paid closer attention if those yellow masks actually dropped down in the middle of a flight.

As I was listening to the pre-flight instructions before we left for Florida, it struck me that recently I have forgotten to put on my own oxygen mask. What got me thinking about my own neglect was the night before we left for Orlando, when I began packing for our trip. I dragged up from storage all of my spring and summer business clothes that have been packed away since last September. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to bring, so I started trying on a few things only to find that some of the skirts and slacks were snug. Everything zipped and snapped, but I found myself more than a little dismayed to realize that some of these things looked a lot better on me when I packed them away than they did now. Ugh! I’m still in my goal range and still at a healthy BMI, although the scale shows I’m up a few pounds.

What has changed over the past few months is that I have not been consistently working out. Regular exercise is definitely my biggest challenge, and I have allowed the tyranny of the urgent to get in the way for far too long. I have “health club” set up as a recurring appointment every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning on my Outlook calendar, and every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning a little reminder pops up, so it’s not that I forget. What has happened is that I keep hitting “ignore” because I think I’m too busy “today.” I have good intentions, to be sure. I fully recognize the need the incorporate regular exercise into my life and understand that this is an integral part of living a healthy lifestyle. But when it all boils down, I haven’t made this a priority. We are very busy with our business, and as a small business owner, there is always something to do. There is always an e-mail to send or respond to, there is always a phone call that needs to be made, there is always a meeting of one kind or another on my calendar. I love the work that we do so I’m thankful and incredibly blessed to be busy, but that busyness has been allowed to crowd out taking care of myself. When I add in family and church responsibilities, it’s far too easy for me to decide day after day that I’m just too busy to exercise “today.”

Realizing that I have some really nice things that are fairly snug at the moment has been the wake-up call that I needed. It’s time to MAKE the time to do the things I need to do to take care of myself and my health. This is about a lot more than just fitting comfortably into my clothes - it’s about continuing my own journey towards optimal health. It’s time for me to get back to the health club on a regular basis and also take a closer look at my own food plan (and, most likely, rein things in a bit to address those few pounds).

It’s so easy for me, and I’m guessing most of us, to allow other things to get in the way of doing what we need to do. Life is busy and rarely slows down to make it convenient for us to make the choices we need to make. Today I’m committed to doing what I encourage you to do - choose wisely J