Sabbatical Zones #4 – The Physical Zone

In the grand scheme of things, and in a normal week, a pastor’s diary is not physically demanding.  We’re not digging ditches or lifting heavy boxes, out in all weathers with the cows or keeping steady on an icy fishing trawler.

By and large, we have a physically safe, physically easy job.

But – that is a slightly double-edged sword.

Because there are some realities we need to acknowledge, so that we are able to sustain ministry for the long haul.  There’s a price to be paid for the majority of our evenings being blocked off by meetings, and it usually carries the price tag of late bed times with a head swimming with thoughts. Lack of sleep is mentally and physically debilitating, both short- and long-term.

There’s a price to be paid for having a frequently sedentary job, which doesn’t push our strength or cardio, and encourages bad posture.  As we age, ‘Use it or lose it’ becomes a reality across our bodies.

There’s a price to be paid for having a frequently sedentary job, which doesn’t push our strength or cardio, and encourages bad posture. 

There’s a price to be paid for only having one day off a week, as we become weary.

That’s not pleading for a special excuse for pastors – I imagine many of our church family face the same issues.

Planning my sabbatical was going to have to have something physical built in, just for my general health.

Now – a word of warning, and then an encouragement.  The warning is that you may know that I have a particular medical history, with chemo and (successful) surgery for cancer a few years ago.  It was a brutal process, and resulted in my being re-plumbed on the inside, and remodelled on the outside. I can’t eat like I used to, or move like I used to.

One encouragement I’ve drawn from that is that because no-one else had my cancer, my treatment or my surgery, in terms of the physical impact I have had to become a world expert in me.  Not even the brilliant team who sorted me out could predict exactly the results they would have on my body – they gave me a range of options and settled down to watch what happened.  So I have researched, experimented, to find the best way for me to stay healthy.

You, likewise, can become the world expert in you.  Now, it may be that you are the same as 99% of other humans, and normal guidance will apply.  It might also be that you have a quirk that you have to take into account.  But if our bodies are good gifts from our Creator, it falls to us to treat them well, and make the best of them.

Because physical training is of some value, after all ( 1 Tim 4:8).

So, I started going to the gym – cardio, strengths, all as you would expect. A sabbatical was a great time to start a new habit.

Except, I discovered a big problem with my back, which then caused ongoing issues throughout the sabbatical, and caused real mobility problems even with simple things like moving through trains and buses.  On one occasion in Milan I simply couldn’t get to the tram door quickly enough to get off.  And that was without the heavy suitcase.

Now, here’s where being a world expert in me kicks in.  It’s possible that my problem is connected to the deep insult to my internal muscle structure during surgery.  It’s also  possible it’s connected to my general pastor’s habit of life.  Maybe both.  The question is, what could I do about it?

I certainly couldn’t simply quit and sit – my heart needs to work, my body needs to move.  So, more deep dives into the internet, sorting out the quacks  from the mentors, to discover the stretching and flexing I need to do, to sort out the underlying tensions, so that I have the best chance of compensating for scar damage, as well as too much sofa duty.

Friends, without being weird, and without setting myself up as any kind of guru or cover-model, can I encourage you to pay attention to the bodily gift God has given you, and make the best of it for the age you are at.

Weight – what story do the scales, or your clothes, tell you?  Do you track and record what is happening down there, regularly? 

Strength – are you lifting, pushing, pulling suitably heavy things, to keep everything working? Are you looking at smaller scale strengths, like keeping your balance?

Speed – of course you’re slower than when you were in your twenties.  But are you doing something which activates your fast-twitch muscles, as well as the big and slow ones?

Flexibility – this is the big one for me.  I’ve seriously underestimated the way my muscles had compensated for so much sitting, and the result is a back and hips mobility problem I am slowly working at stretching out.  There’s a true cliché – you’re not getting old, you just need to stretch more.  That is very true for someone over six feet and over sixty. So I’m hitting lots of deep, long, hard stretches to get everything moving as well as I can manage it. This isn’t a quick fix – it’s months, not weeks.  But I can tell I’m seeing early improvement. So are you stretching, properly, and systematically?

Cardio – this is where I have had to switch out.  I used, before my surgery, to run.  Now I don’t seem to have the core strength to allow that any more –  although I shall be interested to see whether my stretching allows me back into my Sauconys in a few weeks time.  In the meantime I have made friends with the rowing machine at the gym, and having fun with that. What do you do that regularly makes your heart go faster and makes you sweaty?

Is this my perfect plan for life?  No, because I’m not perfect! I have a rule that I have to be pain free before I go the gym, because I want to see if anything I am doing there is contributing to the back problem. So at the moment, I’m just stretching. But if I can end the year lighter, stronger, faster, sweatier, and bendier, even a little bit, I’ll be heading in the right direction.

If I can end the year lighter, stronger, faster, sweatier, and bendier, even a little bit, I’ll be heading in the right direction