Fly Higher

I have to admit it. I've never done a pull-up in my life. I know that doing one pull-up was a requirement in school for getting the Presidential Fitness Award, but I never got one. I even played Division I sports. I did power cleans and I used the bench press regularly for years. I could hit a volleyball pretty darned hard. But never, not once, did I manage to do a pull-up. I wasn't even trying because it didn't seem possible. Most girls I know can't do them, and presidential fitness awards aside, I got it in my head that pull-ups are pretty much impossible and only ridiculously fit women (who make doing pull-ups their day job) can do them. Cue my baby sister...

About 2 months ago, my little sister did her first pull up. She's been working out a lot, and she was quite proud of this feat. Wow, I thought, she could get a presidential fitness award now. Good job. Then about a month later, she did 15 pull-ups in a row. What?! That's not even possible, is it? While I still haven't seen a video, she did send some photographic proof of the award she won. I'm printing it off and keeping it close to remind me that hard work really does pay off!

Our Friday morning book club (which meets at Main Street Cafe in Ankeny at 6:20 am if you're interested!) we are reading the book Interior Castle by St. Teresa of Avila. I love St. Teresa. Her spunk and wisdom make her someone I both love to read and love to keep close in prayer. But sometimes the descriptions of the advanced spiritual life that she gives are about as realistic to me as the idea of doing a pull up. Impossible. Over and over in this book, however, she says how important it is to write about the spiritual experiences that those who are advanced in the spiritual life have obtained through God's grace. She reasons that if you put limits on what God can do in your soul, you need not worry that He will ever accomplish anything in you.

I got to thinking about my little sister. I was so inspired by her hard work and the incredible payoff that she had in seeing such concrete progress in her physical fitness. I need role models like that to help me realize that I can do something to make myself better. It's just the same in the spiritual life. If you think you're already "close" to God and that there really isn't much more that can happen in your interior life, you are about as likely to ascend to the heights of contemplation as I was to do 15 pull ups in high school or college.

So I've decided. I'm tucking my little sister's photo into my worn out old copy of Interior Castle. We all need our role models to call us to expect more of our lives. I'm lucky to have these two incredible ladies to look up to. They both remind me that I can always fly higher.