I want to grow closer to God.. so obviously I went to Reddit.
I found a post where someone asked how people better themselves spiritually, compiled the results and challenged myself to do everything for a week.
The challenge includes running, meditation, journaling, praying, driving to work with NO music, going to church and getting 8 hours of sleep everyday.
It sounds easy but was it? Well if you watched the video you’d know.
But I will spoil it for you.
I was not looking forward to doing several of these, in fact I was dreading them, but I found that by the end of the week I wanted to do almost all of them. It was like I needed them. Especially with what happened on day 4, seriously just go watch it.
I don’t think God or a higher power or spirituality has to be confined to a church building, religion or culture. I think we can find it in our every day lives.
That is why I went to reddit to find God. If you have anything you want me to test or try to feel closer to God, comment and let me know!
I will try and do it, unless it is illegal or harmful.. I am trying to get close to God, but not that close… yet…
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Reddit, the place where philosophers, businessmen, professionals, mods, and pepe live. This is where I’m going to try and find God. I came across this post on our ask men. It asked what people do to grow physically, mentally, and spiritually. I spent way longer than I thought compiling all the answers and then came down to the top ones that I could realistically and legally do in a week. The most common answer was meditation, which makes sense. What did surprise me was a few people said go to church and pray. Now, I go to church and I probably don’t pray as much as I should, so I was okay with those. But what really didn’t excite me was a few people mentioned running. Now, I don’t know if you’ve seen my physique. Running is not something I do by choice. However, this week, I was going to have to. Why am I doing this? You don’t have to do this. The other one that I did not want to do was drive to work with no music, so you can think. Luckily, I only go to work once this week. The bad news is it’s like 30, 35 minutes both ways, which I understand.
For some of you, that’s probably nothing. But music is like my thing. I love music. This was going to be a little tough for me. Some of the not-so-legal responses included taking Ritalin, which I don’t have legal access to, LSD, which I’m not going to do, stealing holy water. Also not going to do that. Oh, yeah, and start a side company so that you can be humbled. Yeah, I’m not doing that. I don’t even have the first company to start the side company. But basically at the end, I came up with this list. Sleep eight hours, meditate, run or walk, go to church, journal, pray, and drive to work with no music. Most of these I can do every day, and I’m going to. For the next week, I’m going to put this spiritual advice to the test and see can I get closer to God. All right, I just woke up. It’s 7:35, which I understand might not be early for a lot of you, but it’s early for me. I’m going to go running. Incredible view. First day running? Not bad. I am not excited to drive to work with no music. Now, I’m sure you’re thinking, driving to work is easy.
Why are you complaining? But here, sit in silence with me. See how you feel. Okay, but actually, it wasn’t that bad. Maybe what I’m normally doing when I listen to music is trying to escape my thoughts, but it was nice to just see them, listen to them. I got to do it on the way home, too. But I didn’t have time to meditate before I went to work, so when I got in, I just found a quiet room and started meditating. Luckily, I am part of Skylight and we have an app for spiritual wellness, so I just picked one of the five-minute meditations. In two, three, four, one, two, three. Honestly, meditation feels like a little weird. I don’t know. But doing it, I don’t know, I feel more calm. The rest of the day was pretty normal and even the car ride home, except for the fact that I had no music. I’m home, so I’m going to go enjoy being home. Then all I had left to do was journal. As I reflected on my first day and how it went, I thought about all the chances I gave myself to think about God and try to connect.
While meditating, running, and having quiet time weren’t inherently spiritual, they gave me time to think about God and life that I wasn’t really using before, and it was actually really nice. Day two went really smooth. I prayed, I ran, and went about my day like normal, which by the way, if you’re curious what I’m watching and listening to, it’s actually videos from Skylight Chill Music’s YouTube. There’s a whole of frequency loops on there, which are great for meditating or just putting on in the background. I actually find myself listening to them quite a bit, like legit. Anyways, that’s what I’m listening to. You should check it out. I did notice that my day was going noticeably better than other days, but it was probably still too early to say it was this newfound Reddit routine on spirituality. Day three was good, too. I prayed, I ran, I meditated. I even went golfing with Danny, which was awesome. It turns out she’s way better than me. How does it feel? Honestly good. I’m better than you. Just kidding. And humble, too. Good day. I got to get things to journal about. By the way, I’m learning how to golf for a future video because Medium said that golfing was the perfect spiritual analogy.
We’ll see about that. Subscribe so you can watch that video. But the point is that day was going great until day four. It’s 6:15 in the morning. Our dog was crying and he threw up and had diarrhea. We’re already taking him to the vet, so I guess that’s good news. Also, it took me three hours to fall asleep because I was anxious someone was breaking in. Now, I have OCD. Not like the OCD where you keep your house really clean and neat. I have the obsessive thoughts over thinking OCD, and I kept thinking that someone was in our house all night. I don’t know why. It just happens sometimes, and I really didn’t get much sleep. I probably didn’t fall asleep till around two. Pretty tired. I did not get eight hours of sleep. By contrast, I can say not having a lot of sleep is not spiritual. I feel like out of it entirely. Because we had to go to the vet, I’m actually going to go on my run later today. I actually miss it a little bit, that. Even though that sounds weird. I do miss running and I think I need it.
I am going to try and find a quiet five minutes at work to do my meditation as soon as I can. Life got in the way and that’s okay. We’ll switch up the schedule and make it all work. I did my meditation and things started to feel a little bit better. I felt like, okay, I’m back on track. Until the vet called. Update on Tato. Tato is going to need surgery on both his knees, unfortunately. It turns out he has a genetic problem called Luxating patellas. He was going to need surgery quick, like next week. We’re not going to say no, we love Tato. I love Tato. That’s him. That leg right here where my shoe is pointing, that’s where it’s hurting him. So we agreed and we set up the date for the surgery. After we got the news, I did go on my run. I actually felt like I needed it. I was really preoccupied about Tato’s surgery and what it was going to mean for Tato in the future, but for us financially. But I found as I was running, I calmed down. Well, the problem didn’t go away. It didn’t seem like as big of a deal.
And journaling was a great moment too. I just felt like it was going to be okay. It was going to be worth it. So even though I did things out of order, I did everything that day and it was still a pretty good day. The nerd is out there. I got a whole bunch of Pokemon here. Day five was a pretty chill day. It was a Saturday, so I slept in a little. We cleaned the house and then we got acai. Then when we came back, I went running. I think I only made it once this week, running without stopping. Today I had to stop. I’m just proud I did it. With Tato being on sedatives and preparing for his surgery, not too much we could do with him, so we just hung out. By now, I was actually looking forward to all my practices, even running. As I journaled, I just thought about the week and I spent good time with Danny, had fun. It was honestly a great day. Day six was Sunday. Favorite tidal wear is this pink one, the one that I wore for our wedding. And then to go with it, I got the matching pink Pokemon socks.
Before you roast me and say that this is sacraligious, Pokemon is a spiritual game. Plus, it’s dope. So we went to church and we even showed up before it started. Normally, we’re a few minutes late, so already off to a great start. It was a pretty normal day at church. Just got out of church. Not bad. My favorite part is always the music. Either singing or hearing musical parts, that’s always my favorite part. Anyways, it was good. Some guy talked about leveling up spiritually and connected it to video games, so that was cool. Hi, Tato. Tato. Hi, boy. I was on some sedatives. Anyways, yeah, good day. I’m going to relax. Today, rather than going on a run, I decided to go on a walk with Danny, and it was actually awesome. We went on a longer walk than normal and just talked, spent good quality time connecting. It was honestly really cool. All right, so we just got back from our walk. How did it go? It was good. That’s it. While I was journaling, even though I had one more day left in the challenge, it was the end of the week. I was looking back and thinking about Tato’s surgery, the time I spent with Danny, and it was a roller coaster of a week, but I felt really well equipped.
I felt like actually doing these things and connecting to God helped me put into perspective what was going on and that it was going to be okay. Even with the bad news of Tato’s expensive surgery, it was a good week. I finally made it to day seven, the last day of the challenge. Honestly, it was probably the most normal of all of them. I woke up, prayed, ran, did my meditation, and just went about my day. When I journaled, I looked back and enjoyed the moments, enjoyed taking intentional time to think about and connect with God, to think about my life, to think about my connections with those around me. I really recommend this. I know this challenge doesn’t sound hard, but you do it for a week. I mean, see if you have the discipline to do it. And if you can’t, that’s all right, but just try. Now, I have my own family traditions, faith traditions, my own definition of spirituality. But I think taking the intentional time to think about God really makes the difference. While I’m definitely going to listen to music while driving, most of these I want to keep doing.
Meditation and journaling were actually my favorite things by the end of the week. I really enjoyed them and I felt like they helped with my anxiety and my OCD as well. I feel like mental health, spiritual health, physical health, they’re all interwoven, and as you boost one, they all go up a little bit. I feel great. So please try this. Try this for a week. Try this for three days. See how you feel. You might be surprised. And if you have any ideas on how to get closer to God, comment. I would love to try them out and subscribe so you can see how they went. Like I said, I have an upcoming video where I’m going to go golfing. So please, anything, let me know. And as for this challenge, it worked.
I guess I can say I found God on Reddit.
dyejo
Guest Author
