Grateful for NP because…(YEG)

Next weekend Sarah will be hitting the streets of Vancouver to run her first half marathon. I’m sure that if you’d asked her a year ago if she would be running even 10km she would have politely said you were crazy. A chance meeting at a conference in Banff paired with a commitment made to her sister brought Sarah to November Project for the first time. Since then she’s been involved in more than one fitness community, spreading her positivity, encouragement, and joy to everyone she comes in contact with. Here’s what November Project means to Sarah…

I am honoured to be asked to write an NP Blog … but even more honoured that some of the people that inspire me on a daily basis may read it.

I want to start by sharing a little bit of my personal journey … to give you a look into the life I had chosen and where I was at before November Project.

Turn back the clocks a couple years and you would have met a very different person than I am today. I think this picture describes it quite well:

Life had gotten away from me … it had swallowed me up … I had lost who I was … I had lost my joy. In my eyes, I believed I wasn’t important and I should definitely not be the priority. So, I threw myself into my passion: teaching! I love being a teacher! I truly love helping others and I thought it was perfectly normal to only concern myself with the happiness and well-being of others.

The pictures you see below are hard for me to look at. I am smiling in them but, there was so much pain and sadness behind those smiles. I was so tired, always sick, and my self-worth was very low. I missed out on so many things with family in friends … I made excuses to get out of things because I was exhausted from carrying around all the extra weight, as my dad would say “the weight of my 11 year old niece Keira”.

I don’t know the exact date … but I remember the morning well (ironically it was in November) I woke up and said “ENOUGH” (literally out loud .. to my husband Oscar’s surprise) with tears streaming down my face, I continued “I am sick and tired of being sick and tired”… little did I know that decision would change life as I had come to know it.

The next 5 months were filled with many struggles and challenges: a lot of tears, a lot of exhaustion, a lot of sweat and A LOT of positive self-talk. One phrase, in particular, being “it didn’t take you a week or a month to get here … it won’t take you that time to get to where you want to be”. I had made the decision to make myself a priority and today I CHOOSE to carry my niece’s weight.

April 27^th, 2016, the day the November Project Seed was planted …

Enter Miss Jen Ference …

I was down in Banff for a leadership conference and Jen was there too. So there I was, waiting for a friend to join me for breakfast and Jen walks up to the table and asks if she and some of her colleagues can join me. Of course, I welcomed the company! We started visiting and the “what do you do?” question came up. Jen shared where she worked & also that she was a co-leader of November Project to which I so eloquently said “Oh, is this that free fitness thing” she chuckled a little and I continued with “yeah, my sister just told me about that, she is going to do the Commonwealth stairs this Wednesday, what’s it all about anyway?”. I was SO oblivious, but Jen was kind enough to share the story of NP and her passion was contagious. I could have listened to her talk about NP all day and before I knew it I had committed to #justshowup next Wednesday… it wasn’t until later that morning when Jen tweeted me out

that I realized I had commited to getting up at 5 a.m. to RUN stairs at 6 AM … and I was NOT a morning person … seriously NO ONE ever “poked the bear”.

So next Wednesday, I showed up, I sat in my car for 10 mins … trying to ignore the butterflies in my stomach … thinking at least I will know 2 people (Jen & my sister).

Walking into Commonwealth was like walking into another world … people were hugging, high fiving, stretching, smiling … seriously SMILING AT 6AM. I spotted Jen, I walked over to be greeted with the biggest smile, biggest hug and a genuine “I’m SO glad you made it”. She introduced me to Andrew and then suddenly everyone started gathering?, bouncing?, and smiling even bigger smiles? The next 30 mins were a whirlwind … I don’t remember how many stairs I completed … just the feelings I felt: happy, joyful, energized, inspired to name a few!

However, later that day (and for the next 4 days) my legs let me experience a whole other feeling … but thankfully? I recovered just in time #justshowup for my second time the following week (funny how that works). This was the day Jen told me I should come out on a Monday or a Friday … to which I replied with a little laugh saying “ I could NEVER get up at 4:30 a.m. 3 times a week, that would just be craziness”. Well friends… NEVER SAY NEVER … once I started I couldn’t stop! November Project has become my absolutely FAVOURITE way to start my day!!

I have taken control back over my health & wellness and have made myself a priority by #justshowingup MWF. I am so grateful for that little breakfast with @JenFerence. November Project has giving me SO MUCH in the past year and the only way I can begin to expressed how grateful I feel is through visuals. Many of these special moments were captured by the amazing individuals the come share their gift with us each week, I will cherish these images forever – thank you!

I will be forever grateful to Jen, Nadim & Andrew for continuing to make us a priority by showing up and for allowing November Project to be the vehicle for so much, including: reconnecting me with friends that I had lost touch with and helping me develop so many new friendships that continue to enrich my life!