The Battle of the Scale

It sits there. Just mocking me. Don't you want to step on me today? Don't you want to put a number to your failure? Don't you want to see how much weight you haven't lost? Don't you want to ruin your entire day with one step?

It taunts me every morning as I get ready for work. It taunts me as I change into my workout clothes. You'll never work out enough to get the number you want. You'll never sweat, run, train enough to get that number lower. 

My first experience with discontentment over that number was at an extremely young age. Maybe 3rd or 4th grade. I am pretty sure I overheard one of my boy classmates tell someone his weight. My immediate reaction was shock. then shame. then embarrassment. then fear.

Discontentment continued into my junior high years when we started having basketball during the day which required locker rooms with lots of girls with exceptionally lower numbers on that scale.

It continued into high school when I automatically knew that number was exponentially higher than all the other girls in my class.

When I was in 10th grade, I had had enough and gave it over to the Lord. The number dropped lower than I had ever seen. The number went up in eleventh grade and back down my senior year. It went significantly up when I went to college. A few rollercoaster dips up and down between there and grad school when I finally got to my lowest number. maybe ever. Then as if I had lost all control all over again, the number went back up.

I hate the scale. I border between treading carefully to not obsess over the number and losing sight of the goal if I don't ever look at the number.

Regardless of all I just typed above, the number does not define me. If you want to define me with words, define me with Jesus. He's the only label I want on me. I know the number matters in order for me to be healthy and have my body in the shape it needs to be in to best serve God, but there has to be boundaries to keep my eyes focused on Jesus and not the number.

My commitment is to treating my body as a temple. Eating healthy. Working out. Trusting God to take care of the number. This is the only way I will be content with the number. When God is put in charge of it. It feels good to let go of that. I was never meant to cling to a number. This does not define me. Jesus does.

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{This series is a part of a writing challenge given by the nester, Myquillyn Smith, to write for 31 Days. You can check the write31days website out here and enjoy hundreds of other bloggers joining together for this challenge. My posts are a part of my personal topic choice of 31 Days of Contentment, and you can find the link for the entire series here.}