GYMNOS – Fitness Scenarios for Self-Examination
Gymnos is the Greek origin of our modern-day word Gym. It means “naked.” GYMNOS articles in Faith & Fitness Magazine are designed to help you challenge your thinking. In the literal sense, when you are naked in the locker room there is nothing to hide. That makes most people uncomfortable. Use this scenario to get naked spiritually—be honest, transparent, undisguised and willing to be totally open with yourself and others. All characters in this scenario are fictional. Any similarity to an actual person is coincidental.
Hi, my name is DeShawn and I need some advice. Before I tell you my problem let me give you a little background.
I’ve worked out since I was eighteen years old. Since then I’ve gone to the gym three days per week to lift weights. For years I have also played tennis on Saturday mornings with my friends, which I really enjoy. The tennis allows me to let out my competitive side and it’s great for exercise.
Originally I got into fitness because of my dad. I always looked up to my father. He was athletic and continually stayed in shape, so naturally I wanted to be like him. My father even had a gym in our garage where he worked out. That’s really where I first discovered the benefits of living a healthy lifestyle. My favorite memories are of doing pushups next to my dad and trying to jump rope as many times as he could.
My schedule is busy and I work a fulltime job. I’ve been married for four years. My family is my life. I love my wife and we’ve always spent as much of our free time together as possible. In the early years of our marriage we often worked out together. I think this time together was crucial for the foundation of our marriage. No matter what we are doing we’ve always enjoyed spending time together to travel and experience different things.
One of the reasons I always exercised regularly was so I could stay in shape for when I had my own children. My father raised all his children to prioritize family and that is what I always planned on doing when I had my own family.
Two months ago my wife and I adopted our first child. He is a wonderfully active young boy and I love him with all my heart.
The problem is that over the last two months I haven’t been able to continue working out as regularly as I always did. I tried working out after work for a couple of weeks after the adoption but that didn’t allow me to spend any time with my son before he went to bed. Then for the next couple of weeks I tried getting up an extra hour early in the morning before work to exercise. But since I work at seven a.m. that required me to get up at five in the morning. After a week of doing that I realized I was too exhausted to spend quality time with my wife or son after work.
I also cut back on playing tennis because that took away from my family time. I really hated doing this because it gave me a competitive outlet and it was my one opportunity to spend quality time with my friends each week.
Now I’m having trouble staying in shape and I feel I’m the least healthy I’ve ever been in my life. Unfortunately it’s because of the very thing I wanted to stay healthy for, my family.
QUESTIONS FOR GROUP DISCUSSION AND PERSONAL REFLECTION:
Now I need your advice.
What should I do?
What would you do if you were in my shoes?
Should personal health or should family be my strongest priority?
Do you think it’s possible for me to prioritize both family and fitness?
What is the correct balance between spending time exercising in order to be healthy and spending time with the family I want to be healthy for?
What are some fitness ideas that could I could implement to achieve both goals?
What scheduling ideas do you have for me that make time for both fitness and family?
HOW OLD ARE YOU?
One of the important ways we can mentally mature and spiritually be strong is to practice intergenerational fitness — exercising WITH others who have a different age than you. To do this, benefit from it and be a benefit to others you should learn about and practice accompaniment.
It’s important to have a flexible mindset if you really want to maximize your opportunities. That means intentionally being more fluid in how you live out a fit lifestyle and expanding the scope of what you do. Some people resist an intergenerational approach to fitness and often outright refuse to do it because they become comfortable in exercising alone or only with certain people close to their age. It shouldn’t be a matter of choosing between one approach or the other. Give yourself the flexibility to do both. Giving yourself this latitude lets you move between familiar and different, easier to more challenging, quite to conversational and much more.
Take time to pray about HOW you do fitness and seek God’s wisdom to expand your personal potential and your spiritual influence among others.
#imoldenoughtodothis
