Rock your body

I am a human being.

I'm not a human thinking.

Or a human doing. Or a human interacting. Or a human feeling.

I am a human being.

It may sound rather simplistic, I know.

But I'm hard-pressed to remember this seemingly simple, yet all-important truth when I'm standing in front of my mirror in the morning, loathing my 6' frame because, laundry dimwit that I am, I just dried my new jeans on the warmest setting and it is SO HARD to find long-enough jeans.

Sometimes, my body makes me crazy. I have these weird quirks, like being super tall, and having alien, undiagnosable allergies to perfumes. There are days (like today) when I find myself wishing that I could do life without all of the annoying parts of being human, like being tired, and hungry, and having to take study breaks to pee.

I mean, wouldn't it be great if we could just go on road trips without having to worry about where the next McDonald's will show up (I am familiar with a rather alarming amount of fast food bathrooms along I-5).

There was an Enlightenment group called the Gnostics that believed spirit was superior to matter. This belief was denounced as heretical by contemporaries of the Gnostics, but it still has great influence today.

But the reality is this: I am matter and spirit rolled up together in this not-so-petite package called a body. As Erwin McManus puts it, "spirit wrapped up in skin."

I need to be reminded that I am, and it is not because I think (sorry, Mr. Descartes).

There is nothing I need to do in order to be a human being. I am because I was created to be.

In the Judeo-Christian tradition, God made humans and he called his creation good. They hadn't done anything yet. They hadn't gotten an A on a philosophy paper, or run a marathon or rescued a stray kitten. No. They were created, they were human beings and that was enough.

I believe I have been created to inhabit this body well. Whether I am eating, sleeping, exercising or whatever else I use my body for, I ought to respond to being intentionally created by caring for my body and living intentionally.

Lauren Winner puts it nicely. Attending to our bodies, she says "is a matter of some urgency, because there is no neutral way to be a body."

If we fail to see our bodies as created with intentionality -- with purpose -- we will listen to "the magazines screaming about taking off five pounds... the all you can eat buffets asking us to stuff our bodies... the fashion designers asking us to parade them."

Oops. Too late.

I want to learn how to revel in the mystery of what it means to be a human being with a body.

How wonderful to feel the cool mist of the first autumn rain! How marvelous to bite into a hot slice of apple pie! How glorious to dance with abandon!

But how difficult to feel pain. Having a body doesn't come without its profound struggles. I certainly don't have the answers to all the questions that pain creates. But I think I would rather feel pain than nothing at all (though I will be honest -- I haven't experienced much pain in my life).

Hmm... Important questions to think about.

Oh, and by the way, I would like to know your secret for making it on long car rides through the middle of nowhere without stopping at every freaking rest stop. Thanks.