Two things I love about cross-country skiing: it is a total body workout and every extremity is warm the entire time. If you want to try this sport sometime, you can rent gear for super-cheap at Weber State's Outdoor Rec office. Snowbasin grooms a track, and so does North Fork up by Eden. Check out TUNA for more information. There's even races, if you're crazy like that.
I can't wait to watch the Nordic events in Sochi in a couple weeks. They are my favorite winter events. They are such great athletes and every time I see them I am inspired to be stronger and healthier.
Skiing Saturday in the bright sunshine I felt a strong sense of gratitude. (I could live with more gratitude every day and my life would be much fuller, but this is a topic for another day). I felt grateful for my healthy body, for a beautiful place to live, for snow, for sun, for my awesome kids, and my supportive and challenging husband (not that he's challenging but that he challenges me) (okay, he's challenging sometimes...aren't we all). During November in Primary we talked a lot about showing gratitude and went over and over different ways to show gratitude for different things.
So I pose the question:
How do you thank your body or show gratitude for it?
Over Saturday and Sunday I really thought about it. The main things I thought about were how I fuel it, and how do I feel about it. Stuffing my body full of sugar or junk is no way to thank my body for the years it has been so good to me, and is sure to hack years off my life span. Having a negative body image is also a betrayal to my body, just like judging a person by their looks. Hating how I look is overlooking the myriad of ways my body is truly awesome.
As women we spend an undue amount of time criticizing, hating, covering, hiding, attempting to change and being ashamed of our bodies. This is not to say that we shouldn't try to continually improve. But just as we are taught not to be hyper-critical of the people in our lives, we should treat our bodies with the same respect.
So thanks, body, for carrying me through 37 years of healthy life, for carrying and bearing and nourishing 3 children, for hugging and laughing and running and swimming and jumping, skiing and sleeping and holding babies, for kissing the people I love, and talking to people I care about. I'm going to treat you nicer, because I still need ya for a lot of years and a lot of challenges yet to come, I'm sure.
Teach your children, especially your daughters, how to show gratitude for their bodies. Example is the best teacher.
Find a way to thank your body today. And thank our Father in Heaven for such an awesome, beautiful, functional, perfect gift.
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