Marathon mentality

If you’ve never run a mile before, it would probably be unwise to try to run a marathon. Your body won’t be conditioned for it, and you will end up injured and miserable. Just as a race requires physical conditioning, rising from past pain will require soul conditioning. It will require exercising authority over your thoughts, emotions, and actions in ways you may have never tried before. This means we all begin our healing journey weak and needing a strength-training regimen. And our souls get stronger the same way our bodies get stronger—by doing that which is unnatural. It’s unnatural to run long distances and lift heavy weights, but building our cardiovascular and musculoskeletal strength requires both.

Romans 12:1-2—And so, dear brothers, I plead with you to give your bodies to God. Let them be a living sacrifice, holy—the kind he can accept. When you think of what he has done for you, is this too much to ask? Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but be a new and different person with a fresh newness in all you do and think. Then you will learn from your own experience how his ways will really satisfy you. TLB