{"id":211,"date":"2019-09-23T18:57:38","date_gmt":"2019-09-23T18:57:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/dev\/desert-foothills\/2019\/09\/23\/pastor-paul-witkop-swimming-at-y\/"},"modified":"2019-09-23T18:57:38","modified_gmt":"2019-09-23T18:57:38","slug":"pastor-paul-witkop-swimming-at-y","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/2019\/09\/23\/pastor-paul-witkop-swimming-at-y\/","title":{"rendered":"Y Member Spotlight: Pastor Paul Witkop"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I grew up in Springfield, Illinois. My parents, not good swimmers themselves, faithfully drove me to swimming lessons every week for many years. I might be the only person in history to flunk the YMCA swimming classes of tadpole and minnow twice each. The problem was <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Hydrophobia\" title=\"learn more about hydrophobia\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">fear<\/a>. I was absolutely terrified to go under the water and hold my breath.\u00a0 Something happened to me as I listened to the Y swimming teacher and watched a trusted friend swim so effortlessly. That friend dared me to swim, to take a chance. \u00a0His encouraging invitation made all the difference.\u00a0 I passed the rest of the classes on the first try and now I am at home in the water.<\/p>\n<h3>More than just swimming<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/\" title=\"Desert Foothills Family YMCA\">The Desert Foothills Family YMCA<\/a> has been a wonderful way to connect with our community.\u00a0 I usually go to the Y several times each week. The other day, for instance, I met some of my friends to play half-court basketball. Another friend called me aside and asked if I would pray with him about a challenge in his household. The Y is much more than a place to work out. I am very committed to physical fitness, and the Y is a key part of my quest. However, deepening current friendships, making new connections, and the opportunities to serve the community have all helped me to strive toward a more balanced life. I am very grateful for my Desert Foothills extended family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It took me a long time to learn how to swim. My parents, not good swimmers themselves, faithfully drove me to swimming lessons every week for many years. I might be the only person in history to flunk the YMCA swimming classes of tadpole and minnow twice each<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":212,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-211","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/212"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/valleyymca.org\/desert-foothills\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}