_________________ A Word from Amy _________________
As children our dreams seem limitless. I remember as a young girl climbing the dogwood tree in the yard of my house and hanging upside down on the branches,
dreaming about what I wanted to be when I grew up. As I played, I told myself stories of all the great things I would do one day. I designed my dream house in my
imagination. I imagined I would be a famous singer and, along with my sisters, put on pretend concerts using hairbrushes as microphones and the fireplace hearth as a
stage. Like most girls, we also acted out our dream weddings. We wrote lists that detailed the colors of our bridesmaid dresses and the kind of flowers that would be in
our bouquets. It was easy for me to dream and believe that all things were possible. I thought I could do anything, and nobody could tell me otherwise.
Think back to your own childhood. You probably had no trouble telling someone what you wanted to be when you grew up. Maybe it made complete sense to say
you were going to be a country music singer or the president of the United States or a doctor (and maybe all at the same time). But guess what? What happened to me
probably happened to you. We grew up. Life happened. And suddenly our dreams began to grow farther and farther out of our reach.
What About Me?
With all the responsibilities that come with having jobs, families, and being involved in our communities, churches, and schools, before we know it we have put
everyone and everything else before our dreams. But wait. Isn’t that the right thing to do? Shouldn’t we always fill a need if we see it? Shouldn’t we be less selfish and
focus on someone or something other than ourselves?
How many times have you found yourself saying something like: If no one else will volunteer, maybe I should. If no one else will host the party, maybe I should. If no
one else will bring the cupcakes, maybe I should. If no one else will work late, maybe I should.
We say these things to ourselves so often that our needs and wants get kicked to the wayside. Go back to school? Get a new job? Focus on our health? We
convince ourselves it’s not the right time. We’ll do those things after we finish a particular project or when our kids start going to school or when our spouse gets
promoted. But guess what? Even when that “right time” comes, we will have even more things to do than before. And we never end up taking care of ourselves the way
we need to.
I know a little bit about this. For many years, I was an expert at always putting myself last. I could never say no to anyone. Saying no to someone meant that person
may not like me, and I could not bear the thought of not pleasing everyone. The problem with being a people-pleaser is that you lose yourself. You become a different
person. You turn into someone you think everyone else wants you to be. My family saw firsthand how depressed I became as I abandoned my needs and wants in
order to look perfect in the eyes of others. They saw how exhausted I became and endured plenty of my meltdowns.
I remember one people-pleasing instance in particular. We were shuffling back and forth to doctors and specialists trying to get our son Rhett evaluated for what was
eventually diagnosed as autism. It was a horrible time, and I felt as though the world was caving in on me.
One bright spot in this dark picture was a woman I met. She and I hit it off and quickly became very close friends. After a little while, she started working for my
husband’s business.
This friend of mine didn’t have anyone who could pick up her kids at school in the afternoons, so I volunteered to do it for her. No big deal, right? Well, this all
happened in the beginning stages of Rhett’s autism where he screamed nonstop, especially when he was in the car. His screaming was so bad, I bought our other
children earplugs because I was worried it would affect their hearing. I actually lost some hearing in my left ear because Rhett sat behind me in the car.
Our afternoon routine was the same every day. I would pack up Rhett in the car to go pick up my two other kids and hers at their school, which was an hour away.
Rhett screamed the entire way. Then we would wait in the elementary school car line for thirty minutes for the kids to get let out. Rhett screamed while we waited. Once
the three kids got in the car, we would all drive to the middle school to pick up my friend’s daughter. More screaming. It was torture for the kids and me. Finally, we
would drive an hour back home, and all the kids would stay at my house until my friend picked her children up.
It was months before I finally told my friend that I couldn’t do it anymore. You know what happened? She wasn’t upset at all. She was fine with me stepping down
and had no trouble finding a replacement driver. I was so worried that she would be mad at me that I kept saying yes just to please her.
Does this scenario sound familiar? How many times have you sacrificed your time, your energy, your sanity, your health, or your relationships to do something to
please someone else? When we do this, we simply endure our lives rather than live them.
Without dreams, we don’t really live. We only exist. We go through the motions. We don’t live the kind of life God has called each and every one of us to live.
In 2004, I found myself trapped inside a world that I did not want and in a body that I hated. And while I was still doing everything for everyone other than me, I was
just not able to make everyone happy all the time. I felt like a complete failure. The only thing that made me feel better was food, and I turned to it all the time for
comfort.
Eating so much made me increasingly tired. I remember the day that I stopped going upstairs in our home. There were two reasons for this. First, going up the stairs
always revealed some destruction that Rhett had done. He would color on the walls, smear feces all over the windows, take the bifold closet doors off the tracks and
throw them on the floor, run the water and overflow the bathtub, and so on. You never knew what you were going to find when you went upstairs. So I opted not to
find out and stayed on the first floor as much as possible.
Second, walking up the stairs made me extremely winded and hurt my legs. Not wanting to face the fact that my weight might be affecting my health, I chose to avoid
the issue. I had good reasoning behind this. If I never went up the stairs, I would never feel winded. If I never felt winded, I didn’t have to admit I had a problem.
I survived a good portion of this trying time using the strategy of avoidance. But it only took me further from the life I once dreamed of living.
God Is the Giver of DreamsThe Bible tells us that if we delight in God, He will give us the desires of our heart (see Psalm 37:4). I am not a preacher, but I always interpreted that passage to
mean that when we were created, along with God giving us our fingers and toes, He placed in our hearts a desire for fulfilling a specific purpose.
Desire propels us to push toward doing what we were created to do. It powers our dreams. It moves us in the direction of where we need to go. It makes us pursue
someone to share our life with. It makes us long to have children. But desire can be minimized through tough circumstances. When life happens, it is easy to wake up
one day and realize we have forgotten what it was that we dreamed about doing with our lives.
Think about your own desires and your current life circumstances. Have the desires of your heart gone away? Have you forgotten about the dreams of yesterday?
Are you so consumed with life and its routines that you have no time or energy or even want to dream? What are those things you desire that you know, deep down in
your heart, God has placed in you?
Before being a contestant on The Biggest Loser, I was not dreaming big dreams. I wasn’t dreaming at all. I felt time slipping away from me as I struggled to fix all the
financial problems that plagued our family while trying to figure out a way to best help Rhett. I was depressed. It took all the energy I had to get up in the morning. As
soon as I got up, I prayed for God’s strength to make it through another day.
God eventually answered my prayers. Day by day, the knots in my life slowly started to unravel. Phil and I became real estate agents and were making more money.
We found a wonderful therapy for Rhett. We had a great group of friends and family. Things were looking up.
I’ve found that as soon as one area of my life gets straightened out, it gives me the courage to focus on other areas that need attention. The magnifying glass went full
focus on our weight.
Through all the drama, trials, and troubles Phil and I experienced, we packed on the pounds. Phil was at his heaviest, a staggering 340 pounds, and I had reached
clinical obesity at 229 pounds. My goodness, how were we going to get this weight off?
Once again, I believe that Providence stepped in. Who would have thought that the way God would plan for us to face this giant would be on a reality television
show? But He did, and the things we learned forever changed the course of our lives.
The journey toward better health taught us that we needed to allow ourselves to wake up and dream again. God had more in store for us than even the wonderful
things He was already doing with our family and our finances. He wasn’t going to intervene in just one aspect of our lives; He wanted to work with us in every area so
we could live lives of abundance. We had to stop settling and start dreaming.
It’s Your Turn
You may be thinking that you have too many obstacles in your life. You may be thinking that you will never be able to overcome the challenges that face you in order
to do the things you want to do. It is the dream that motivates the change. It is the dream that powers the desire. If you give yourself permission to start dreaming again,
things will happen. Your life will change.
We want to take the first step with you in dreaming again. You need to start this journey by dreaming about what you want your life to be. Not whining about what it
looks like right now. Not making excuses for why you can’t change it. Not settling for a life that is mediocre. It’s time to make a new vision for your life.
This book focuses on your health, and your dreams will revolve around that focal point. But don’t stop there. Think about your personal life. Your career. Your
family. Think about every facet of your life and the dreams that come from those places. It doesn’t matter how big or small they are. What matters is that you just dream.
How do you do this? Start by finding a quiet place where you can spend a half hour or so alone without distractions. Take yourself back to the time when you believed that dreams could come true. Think about what your life could look like and how you would feel if some of your dreams came true. Maybe you want to lose
fifty pounds. Maybe you want to pay off your debt. Maybe you want to be a better parent. Maybe you want to go back to school. The point of this exercise is to
imagine a better life.
Here are some questions to help get you started. Ask yourself these questions out loud, and in the space below, write down your answers. You might want to create
some of your own questions and answers.
“If I were at a healthy weight, what would that look like?”
“What would it feel like to buy clothes in size _____?”
“What if I didn’t have to dread getting dressed in the morning?”
“What if I could play with my kids without getting out of breath?”
“What would I do differently if money were not an issue?”
“What churches or charities would I give to if I had more than enough finances?”
“If nothing were holding me back, what would I most like to do in life that I haven’t done?”
“What things did I dream about doing before life took over?”
Dust off that box of dreams hidden deep within you and know that anything is possible with God. God has not forgotten you. He has bigger plans for you. Bigger than
you can imagine. Make the commitment to dream, and it will keep you moving in the right direction even in your toughest times.
As children our dreams seem limitless. I remember as a young girl climbing the dogwood tree in the yard of my house and hanging upside down on the branches,
dreaming about what I wanted to be when I grew up. As I played, I told myself stories of all the great things I would do one day. I designed my dream house in my
imagination. I imagined I would be a famous singer and, along with my sisters, put on pretend concerts using hairbrushes as microphones and the fireplace hearth as a
stage. Like most girls, we also acted out our dream weddings. We wrote lists that detailed the colors of our bridesmaid dresses and the kind of flowers that would be in
our bouquets. It was easy for me to dream and believe that all things were possible. I thought I could do anything, and nobody could tell me otherwise.
Think back to your own childhood. You probably had no trouble telling someone what you wanted to be when you grew up. Maybe it made complete sense to say
you were going to be a country music singer or the president of the United States or a doctor (and maybe all at the same time). But guess what? What happened to me
probably happened to you. We grew up. Life happened. And suddenly our dreams began to grow farther and farther out of our reach.
What About Me?
With all the responsibilities that come with having jobs, families, and being involved in our communities, churches, and schools, before we know it we have put
everyone and everything else before our dreams. But wait. Isn’t that the right thing to do? Shouldn’t we always fill a need if we see it? Shouldn’t we be less selfish and
focus on someone or something other than ourselves?
How many times have you found yourself saying something like: If no one else will volunteer, maybe I should. If no one else will host the party, maybe I should. If no
one else will bring the cupcakes, maybe I should. If no one else will work late, maybe I should.
We say these things to ourselves so often that our needs and wants get kicked to the wayside. Go back to school? Get a new job? Focus on our health? We
convince ourselves it’s not the right time. We’ll do those things after we finish a particular project or when our kids start going to school or when our spouse gets
promoted. But guess what? Even when that “right time” comes, we will have even more things to do than before. And we never end up taking care of ourselves the way
we need to.
I know a little bit about this. For many years, I was an expert at always putting myself last. I could never say no to anyone. Saying no to someone meant that person
may not like me, and I could not bear the thought of not pleasing everyone. The problem with being a people-pleaser is that you lose yourself. You become a different
person. You turn into someone you think everyone else wants you to be. My family saw firsthand how depressed I became as I abandoned my needs and wants in
order to look perfect in the eyes of others. They saw how exhausted I became and endured plenty of my meltdowns.
I remember one people-pleasing instance in particular. We were shuffling back and forth to doctors and specialists trying to get our son Rhett evaluated for what was
eventually diagnosed as autism. It was a horrible time, and I felt as though the world was caving in on me.
One bright spot in this dark picture was a woman I met. She and I hit it off and quickly became very close friends. After a little while, she started working for my
husband’s business.
This friend of mine didn’t have anyone who could pick up her kids at school in the afternoons, so I volunteered to do it for her. No big deal, right? Well, this all
happened in the beginning stages of Rhett’s autism where he screamed nonstop, especially when he was in the car. His screaming was so bad, I bought our other
children earplugs because I was worried it would affect their hearing. I actually lost some hearing in my left ear because Rhett sat behind me in the car.
Our afternoon routine was the same every day. I would pack up Rhett in the car to go pick up my two other kids and hers at their school, which was an hour away.
Rhett screamed the entire way. Then we would wait in the elementary school car line for thirty minutes for the kids to get let out. Rhett screamed while we waited. Once
the three kids got in the car, we would all drive to the middle school to pick up my friend’s daughter. More screaming. It was torture for the kids and me. Finally, we
would drive an hour back home, and all the kids would stay at my house until my friend picked her children up.
It was months before I finally told my friend that I couldn’t do it anymore. You know what happened? She wasn’t upset at all. She was fine with me stepping down
and had no trouble finding a replacement driver. I was so worried that she would be mad at me that I kept saying yes just to please her.
Does this scenario sound familiar? How many times have you sacrificed your time, your energy, your sanity, your health, or your relationships to do something to
please someone else? When we do this, we simply endure our lives rather than live them.
Without dreams, we don’t really live. We only exist. We go through the motions. We don’t live the kind of life God has called each and every one of us to live.
In 2004, I found myself trapped inside a world that I did not want and in a body that I hated. And while I was still doing everything for everyone other than me, I was
just not able to make everyone happy all the time. I felt like a complete failure. The only thing that made me feel better was food, and I turned to it all the time for
comfort.
Eating so much made me increasingly tired. I remember the day that I stopped going upstairs in our home. There were two reasons for this. First, going up the stairs
always revealed some destruction that Rhett had done. He would color on the walls, smear feces all over the windows, take the bifold closet doors off the tracks and
throw them on the floor, run the water and overflow the bathtub, and so on. You never knew what you were going to find when you went upstairs. So I opted not to
find out and stayed on the first floor as much as possible.
Second, walking up the stairs made me extremely winded and hurt my legs. Not wanting to face the fact that my weight might be affecting my health, I chose to avoid
the issue. I had good reasoning behind this. If I never went up the stairs, I would never feel winded. If I never felt winded, I didn’t have to admit I had a problem.
I survived a good portion of this trying time using the strategy of avoidance. But it only took me further from the life I once dreamed of living.
God Is the Giver of DreamsThe Bible tells us that if we delight in God, He will give us the desires of our heart (see Psalm 37:4). I am not a preacher, but I always interpreted that passage to
mean that when we were created, along with God giving us our fingers and toes, He placed in our hearts a desire for fulfilling a specific purpose.
Desire propels us to push toward doing what we were created to do. It powers our dreams. It moves us in the direction of where we need to go. It makes us pursue
someone to share our life with. It makes us long to have children. But desire can be minimized through tough circumstances. When life happens, it is easy to wake up
one day and realize we have forgotten what it was that we dreamed about doing with our lives.
Think about your own desires and your current life circumstances. Have the desires of your heart gone away? Have you forgotten about the dreams of yesterday?
Are you so consumed with life and its routines that you have no time or energy or even want to dream? What are those things you desire that you know, deep down in
your heart, God has placed in you?
Before being a contestant on The Biggest Loser, I was not dreaming big dreams. I wasn’t dreaming at all. I felt time slipping away from me as I struggled to fix all the
financial problems that plagued our family while trying to figure out a way to best help Rhett. I was depressed. It took all the energy I had to get up in the morning. As
soon as I got up, I prayed for God’s strength to make it through another day.
God eventually answered my prayers. Day by day, the knots in my life slowly started to unravel. Phil and I became real estate agents and were making more money.
We found a wonderful therapy for Rhett. We had a great group of friends and family. Things were looking up.
I’ve found that as soon as one area of my life gets straightened out, it gives me the courage to focus on other areas that need attention. The magnifying glass went full
focus on our weight.
Through all the drama, trials, and troubles Phil and I experienced, we packed on the pounds. Phil was at his heaviest, a staggering 340 pounds, and I had reached
clinical obesity at 229 pounds. My goodness, how were we going to get this weight off?
Once again, I believe that Providence stepped in. Who would have thought that the way God would plan for us to face this giant would be on a reality television
show? But He did, and the things we learned forever changed the course of our lives.
The journey toward better health taught us that we needed to allow ourselves to wake up and dream again. God had more in store for us than even the wonderful
things He was already doing with our family and our finances. He wasn’t going to intervene in just one aspect of our lives; He wanted to work with us in every area so
we could live lives of abundance. We had to stop settling and start dreaming.
It’s Your Turn
You may be thinking that you have too many obstacles in your life. You may be thinking that you will never be able to overcome the challenges that face you in order
to do the things you want to do. It is the dream that motivates the change. It is the dream that powers the desire. If you give yourself permission to start dreaming again,
things will happen. Your life will change.
We want to take the first step with you in dreaming again. You need to start this journey by dreaming about what you want your life to be. Not whining about what it
looks like right now. Not making excuses for why you can’t change it. Not settling for a life that is mediocre. It’s time to make a new vision for your life.
This book focuses on your health, and your dreams will revolve around that focal point. But don’t stop there. Think about your personal life. Your career. Your
family. Think about every facet of your life and the dreams that come from those places. It doesn’t matter how big or small they are. What matters is that you just dream.
How do you do this? Start by finding a quiet place where you can spend a half hour or so alone without distractions. Take yourself back to the time when you believed that dreams could come true. Think about what your life could look like and how you would feel if some of your dreams came true. Maybe you want to lose
fifty pounds. Maybe you want to pay off your debt. Maybe you want to be a better parent. Maybe you want to go back to school. The point of this exercise is to
imagine a better life.
Here are some questions to help get you started. Ask yourself these questions out loud, and in the space below, write down your answers. You might want to create
some of your own questions and answers.
“If I were at a healthy weight, what would that look like?”
“What would it feel like to buy clothes in size _____?”
“What if I didn’t have to dread getting dressed in the morning?”
“What if I could play with my kids without getting out of breath?”
“What would I do differently if money were not an issue?”
“What churches or charities would I give to if I had more than enough finances?”
“If nothing were holding me back, what would I most like to do in life that I haven’t done?”
“What things did I dream about doing before life took over?”
Dust off that box of dreams hidden deep within you and know that anything is possible with God. God has not forgotten you. He has bigger plans for you. Bigger than
you can imagine. Make the commitment to dream, and it will keep you moving in the right direction even in your toughest times.
1 comments:
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