Life lessons from painting

Before


Recently I painted my son’s room and I wanted to laugh at
the way my mind thinks. As I’m painting the room and dealing
with emotions (impatience, frustration, being overwhelmed,
excitement & relief), my mind relates my experience to my
Olympic experience and also my experience with God. I know,
it’s weird and believe me, I’m not making these things up,
they just come to mind.

So I bought the paint and wanted to start painting right away.
I found a paintbrush and opened the can of paint. Before I could
paint, I needed to tape the base boards, chair railing and crown
molding, unless I wanted to see marks of paint all over the place.
So I proceeded to start taping and remembered just how long
this part takes! I became impatient because I had to be careful
to keep the tape on a straight line. I did part of the room and
thought, I really want to paint, so I’ll tape the other part later.
Then I got the paint brush and started edging the bottom, top and
corners. I got a little annoyed that this part took so long too,
because I really just wanted to grab the roller and do the “fun”
part. It’s always the quickest and easiest part! I realize that
the reason rolling is so “fun” is because all the hard work was
done first. When I finally finished the room, I appreciated
the “hard” part the most because as I took the tape off, the
lines were straight and the room looked great! I started out
impatient because it took so long and ended up excited that I
FINALLY painted over the artistic masterpiece of bright pink
marker all over one wall by my 2-yr-old son, and the room was
finished! All the work was more than worth it!

Half-way there


So what were my other thoughts? I thought about how on the
Olympic Team we practice and work out many times by ourselves
hours a day, and also travel the country to play over 60 games,
all in preparation for the Olympic Games. When we finally get
to the Olympics, the hard work is done. Now it’s time to show
what we’ve been working on all year! When I stood on the podium
and the Gold Medal was placed around my neck, I knew that ALL
the HARD WORK was MORE THAN WORTH IT!

And finally, my walk with God: I daily have victories and
struggles and learn many lessons along the way.
Many times it can seem like life is the longest marathon
ever! No matter what I go through or how much “hard work”
there seems to be, to know God and experience His love is
MORE THAN WORTH IT! One day I will see God face to face and
I will find out what that means in a whole new way! I also
can't fathom the thought but God loves us so much that He
sent Jesus on the cross for our sins because He thinks
WE ARE MORE THAN WORTH IT!

The hard work was worth it!