Girls on the Run Sample Lesson 1

> First of all picture a bright white light that rests just on the inside of your body—maybe right where your heart is. That light is so bright and when we are feeling good about ourselves it just shines out of us—through our eyes, our fingertips, in the way we walk and stand up tall and straight. That white light is the very essence of who we are. It is what makes us special, unique and beautiful on the inside.

> Now picture a large socket in the top of your head. It is like a socket that is in the wall where you plug in an electrical appliance. Can you see it in the top of your head? Now, imagine a huge cord going into that socket. This cord is really yucky—it has gooey, sticky very slow-moving mucky liquid flowing through it. And also coming in through this cord are some messages we might get sometimes. Some of these messages are “You are not thin enough”,” you are not pretty enough”, “you are not sporty enough”, “you don’t have cool clothes”, “you are not very smart” or “ you shouldn’t ever get angry” or “it is not okay to cry”. When this brown stuff and these messages go into our brains and oozes down into our body we feel yuck. The brown stuff begins to put out that bright light, like syrup oozing down on your pancakes in the morning. When this happens, we do not stand up as tall, we might feel sad a lot or might not try some exciting activities we are interested in. We just don’t feel good about ourselves with this brown cord coming into our spirits.

> Now, here’s the fun part. We each need to take our right hand and gently pull that cord right out of our heads. Pull it out and throw it right behind you, somewhere far away. Now I want you to plug in the Girls on the Run cord. I can see into this cord and it is bright, multi-colored and sparkly. The liquid in it is bubbly and moves freely down into your body and makes the light inside of your heart…the light that is YOU…sparkle, glitter and become brighter and stronger…so strong that you begin to have light coming out of your fingertips, your mouth, your nose, your toes and your eyes! The Girls on the Run cord helps us stand up tall and believe in ourselves. We express everything we are feeling. We know that we are wonderful. We can look all people right into their eyes and we feel absolutely NO shame about who we are! We know that “we are perfect just the way we are!” This is what Girls on the Run is all about! Helping all of us, including ME, realize how special we are, each as individuals, but also as a wonderful team together!!!

> So anytime we are having a brown, murky chord kind of day we need to promise to each other that we will ask each other to help us unplug from those negative messages and feelings and let the colorful, sparkly, positive light in each of us shine. Can we promise this to each other?’