Training camp is hard to put into words. There were many moments that I experienced more of God and began to remove Him from this box that I placed Him in. There were many moments of brokenness as I realized lies that I believed about myself. Then moments followed when God showed me my true worth as His beloved daughter. Overall, the experience was difficult, yet so, so worthwhile.
If you know me from any context outside of the World Race, you would know how uncomfortable it is for me to talk about spooning, much less participate in it. Everything within me cringes when I think about laying so close to someone that either their butt is touching me or my butt is touching them.
One night during our 10 day training camp, they dropped my squad off at a state park, in the pouring rain, with nothing but food, a tarp and rope.
Naturally, this was my reaction:
Hear me out…I considered myself a tough person. After playing 4 years of college basketball, going through countless Crossfit workouts, and having my fair share of difficult circumstances, I figured nothing could be more difficult than what I’ve already been through.
Around 10PM, there we were, all 55 of us laying on the cold, wet ground attempting to talk our bodies into sleeping and hoping that this was some sort of joke.
I wish I could tell you that this was the point that I sat up, pulled my snuggie-buddies together and began to encourage them in the things of Christ. Yet only an hour later, I was physically shaking from the cold, sat up, and began to cry to myself.
The girl next to me listened to my constant complaining about how I was going to die from pneumonia, or from frost bite, or the stench of our dirty bodies. After I got all of my feelings out, she proceeded to take off her jacket, lay it over me, and rub my legs for almost 30 minutes. I tried to stop her, tell her that I was okay, and that she needed her jacket, but she did it anyways.
In that moment, she showed me Jesus. I felt pain and uncomfortable, but she showed me the love that I needed.
I learned many lessons from this night (and Training Camp overall):
- Spooning saves lives.
- Your body can withstand way more than you think possible.
- If you accept the help of someone else, it doesn’t make you weaker, but more human.
- Allow yourself to have a moment.
- Impossible situations can turn around quickly with the positivity of a few.
As you can imagine, difficulty (and spooning) always brings people together. Our squad was way more comfortable and honest with each other after this night together.
A few days later, I met my team and we named ourselves Team Galene (pronounced Gal-ay-nay), which means calmness, stillness of the sea, or a calm. We named ourselves this because this is the feeling that we got as we worked together and it is what we want to bring to others as we share the love of God.
As we move forward and launch in only a few weeks, my prayer is that I can show the same compassion and love to others who may feel the same despair, pain, and frustration as I did that night. I pray that we would be the first to love on those struggling around us and point them towards Christ.
Also, if you were curious if there were any fun moments, check out the video my squad-mate Josh made 🙂
