Finding God in Van Halen once again...no, really

I’ve said many times recently (if only to myself) that I feel far from God. I know it’s because I’ve pushed myself away, rather than God pulling away. God loves us and he never leaves us, even when it seems like he has. I don’t know why bad things happen or why they are allowed to happen and quite frankly, I long ago stopped trying to figure that out. I simply choose to remind myself that God loves me and I’m good enough.

Lately though, God and I have been having some interesting chats. I mean, if you can’t talk to him, who can you really talk to and trust?  I feel that maybe slowly, surely I’m finding my way back to a good place and better relationship with him and that makes me very happy. I’ve found a Bible study that I enjoy and that makes me want to go back again each week. Hopefully one day I’ll find a church that makes me feel the same way. I love Jesus, but I don’t always like religion, but having a faith community is something that I need and I know it.

On the drive in to work this morning, Van Halen’s “I Can’t Stop Loving You” cycled up in iTunes and I have to say that I nearly started crying. Which would be a great sight on Gervais Street early in the morning – some silly crying female trying to turn left onto Bull Street.  No, I wasn’t crying because it was Sammy and not Dave (as I tend to prefer the Hagar years over Roth), but because that’s the song I hear when I know that God is talking to me. When he’s reminding me that he loves me and nothing I ever do is going to take that love away.

I told this story years ago and there are still those that I know roll their eyes at the notion of God speaking through a Van Halen song, but I believe that God speaks to us in the ways that he knows we will hear him and listen. This song, however, is “our song”. It’s the song I have with God. You can keep your “Amazing Grace” and all that stuff because I’ve got this. Yeah, it’s not Bon Jovi, but that would be too obvious. It's better. 

The original blogpost on this (also pasted below) is worth a read to understand better where I’m coming from and how this came about, but I felt so much love and understanding this morning that I wanted to cry. It was nearly overwhelming…and absolutely what I need right now in my life.

As I said back then, “I think if you look and listen, you will find God all around you, every day.  You never know when or how or why He is going to send you a message. You just have to be open to it.” I have a few things going on right now that I don’t really talk about with anyone except God and it’s so good to be reminded that he’s listening, that he loves me, and that I seem to be on the right path.  I can only wish that for us all.

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June 28, 2011

Play It Again Sam(my Hagar)

Once upon a time I wrote a little blog for my church group (back when I used to do a weekly email for the group) about how I heard God talking to me through a Cher song.  And I've heard God speak to me through an episode of WKRP in Cincinnati as well.  And I've frequently heard God speaking to me through a Van Halen song.  I searched and searched and cannot find the blog I thought I'd written about this years ago, because some time around the Cher experience is when I think this all came about.

Now, there are those that scoff at hearing God speak to you in any other way than through reading the Bible.  Well, I disagree. I think if you look and listen, you will find God all around you, every day.  You never know when or how or why He is going to send you a message. You just have to be open to it.

On this particular day I was out in my yard pruning the lantanna. Which is not my favorite thing and generally only happens in January or February once the leaves have fallen.  I'm not sure exactly how my head got into this particular place, but I was talking with God and wondering how he could stand the human race most of the time. I mean, good grief!  We are a messed up bunch of people that's for ding dang sure.  Fortunately, God offers us grace and forgiveness and salvation.  Can't get much luckier - or rather, blessed -than that.

So as I'm pruning and pondering and asking God how he can love someone like me, who is certainly undeserving, the Van Halen song "I Can't Stop Loving You" came on and I heard these words:

There's a time and place for everything, for everyone 
We can push with all our might, but nothin's gonna come 
Oh no, nothin's gonna change 
And if I asked you not to try 
Oh could you let it be

and 

I can't stop lovin' you 
And no matter what I say or do 
You know my heart is true, oh 
I can't stop loving you 

I can't clearly recall, but I think I started laughing a little bit at the fact that at the very moment when I needed something like this, this song came on.  And I truly believe it was God speaking to me. Reassuring me.  Reminding me that no matter what I do, He can't and won't stop loving me.  It was pretty cool.

So now every time that song pops up on my iPod, I stop and smile and listen, remembering that God loves me. Even though I don't deserve it.  And that sometimes, if He asks me not to push and try so hard, can I just let it be.  I'm grateful for God's love and His grace, especially when I have no idea what is going to happen or which way my life is headed (which is basically all the time the past few years, or so it seems).  And I'm grateful that God chooses seemingly strange places and things to use to speak to me. I believe God chooses the avenue that is best for the individual and how He knows He can get through to us.  And he definitely does get through to me in this song.  I dunno... maybe it has something to do with Sammy's hair.  :o)

The Ugly Truth

The other day a friend emailed me to ask what motivated me to finally lose weight. I feel like all I do on social media is talk about weight loss. Well, that and eating cake. Yeah, those things don't go together, but there you have it. But I digress...

This friend wasn't looking for a magic pill or wave of a wand, but really wanted to know what changed mentally to help me start to change physically. I can’t speak for anyone else, but that’s how it had to happen for me. Something flipped in my brain and said, “Enough!” and I knew I had to start helping myself to heal and get healthy. Yeah. Heal. That’s a biggie it seems. I’m not sure I ever really realized a lot of what my weight was about, but I have a tad more wisdom now, for whatever it’s worth to the world.

It started at my 25^th high school reunion in October 2014, when I saw pictures of myself and how bad I looked. I never realized just how big I'd gotten until then. I was in denial. I struggled for a while after that because I don't have great self-control at all - hence all the cake I eat all the time - and needed something to hold me accountable. When left to my own devices, I do tend to go off the rails.

In January 2015, I heard about a research study taking place at the University of South Carolina about the effects of sleep deprivation on weight loss and quickly signed up to participate. Since they expected you to lose some weight each week and made us track all food intake in a journal that we turned in (which really just showed calorie intake and they had given us a specific amount of calories we could eat on a certain number of days per week) then I was accountable to someone to stay on track. If I wasn’t losing weight, they were going to sit me down and ask why and I didn’t want that. I wanted to push forward for myself and so that I didn’t let them down. I was the 2^nd participant to complete the study and, based on some conversations with the person running it, one of the more compliant. I didn’t complain (which is shocking for me since I complain all the time about basically everything), I lost weight every week (about 1-2 pounds which is how you want to do it), and did everything they asked of me.

When the study ended, I had lost around 20 pounds, which was 50% of the goal I’d set for myself. I didn’t set out to lose 40 pounds, but to get to a specific number, which was 175 pounds. I started at 218 and 175 seemed like a good number. Today the scales registered 173.6 which is the first time in a year that I’ve gotten to or below my goal weight! I’m pretty excited about that. Unfortunately, my standard way to celebrate is wanting to eat cake. Or cookies. Go have a milkshake. I won’t lie and pretend that I didn’t eat a brownie today, but I also forced myself outside for a 3 mile walk. Hahahaha That totally makes it sound like I’m some person who has enough sense to balance what they eat with exercise and I’m really not that kind of person. It’s just how today turned out.

Ultimately, I knew that once I saw some results I would get motivated and I was right. I needed something that would force me into action and the study did that. I need to pay more attention to what I eat rather than just the calories in the food because I'd like to lose some belly fat and some of the fat on my thighs. The real challenge I’m facing is to KEEP it off and start balancing my diet better. If I eat crap food all the time that’s not helping my body be healthy and heal and that’s what I’m after. Feeling healed. It’s for sure that the digestive issues I’ve battled for 20 years have greatly improved. It’s not often these days that my body has a violent reaction to food, whereas in the past it was happening more than once a week. To say that is a blessing would be a gross understatement.
Exercise has also helped a lot because once I lost weight and started being more active, it is easier to be more active. It's helped my digestion problems and it's helped the arthritis in my feet. I used to be where I couldn't do much walking at all without a lot of pain and now I'm so much better with less pain. It's been a blessing for sure.

In the end it’s mostly that I got tired of looking in the mirror and not liking what I saw. That's why I don't like photos of myself - even though I keep taking stupid selfies now, but I'm just excited sometimes when I think I might actually look good. I didn't do this for men, but it's a nice notion that now I seem to attract a little male attention and that's never been the case for me in my life. Although I will say that I think I've tended to hide behind food and being fat as a defense mechanism in life. I could say, "Well, no one is interested in me because I'm fat" and leave it at that because as far as I knew it was true. Now, I also tend to be really snarky and controlling at times and probably do scare some men off with that (and if I could scare them, I wouldn’t want to date them), so it's not all the weight, but now I do get attention that I didn't get in the past and it's a nice change, even if it's just someone complimenting me on looking nice one day or something. I’ll take it.

It's hard and I'm not going to lie. I struggle every day. Not only with food, but with my self-esteem issues. I’ll never look in the mirror and see someone who is pretty. I’ll never look and see someone who isn’t fat. At least that’s how it feels, even on the days when I look and think, “Hey, maybe I look ok today.” It’s so vile how we torture ourselves about our appearance. The only thing I know for sure is that I’m done hiding behind my weight. I’m done hiding, period. It got me nowhere, whereas pushing the boundaries and forcing myself outside of my comfort zone has gotten me to a happy place. And if weight loss played a huge part in that, then that’s the way it is. I never realized I was hiding from the world behind the extra pounds and baggy clothes, but I was. Hiding from myself as much as anyone else, but no more. Being happy is so much more fun and I refuse to let that feeling go.