If you want to, you have permission to go fast. You don’t have to wait for anybody else. You don’t have to waste any time. As long as you are working with good form, you can go as fast as you want and that is entirely good.
A lot of us who were raised female got the message that we shouldn’t be too fast or too good at stuff. It might cause awkward questions. We don’t need that kind of baggage. We can run as fast as we possibly can and no one gets to tell us not to.
Go play.
Balance requires lots of things, from proprioception to strong stabilizers and more. The compound exercises here and the ones that work asymmetrically help us improve balance. Three rounds.
jacks | 30 |
skullcrushers | 20 |
renegade rows | 10 |
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kb alt arm swing | 30 |
kb hammer curl | 20 |
kb halo | 10 |
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1 arm clean and press | 30 |
Arnold press | 20 |
windscreen wipers | 10 |
Today’s permission has a bunch of flavors. We have permission to play games. Here are some ways that might play out (pun intended).
1. Literal games. We can get our workout while playing football or pickleball or soccer or water polo or baseball.
2. Mind games. We can see if we can trick ourselves into doing one more rep or one more sprint.
3. Distracting games. On a long run or bike or hike? Play the alphabet game like you did when you were stuck in the car as a kid. Or I Spy. Or race other people to landmarks (with or without telling them!).
4. Streak games. How many days in a row can you show up at the gym? How many workouts can you make it before you need new shoes? How long can you go before washing that lucky shirt (actually, please don’t do that one. The other people in the gym don’t deserve that.)
This particular permission may be controversial and we may have to use our good judgment in how we deploy it. We have permission to swear.
Let me digress into a (relevant) story. Back when I was a freshman in high school lo these many years ago, I had to take P.E. For me at the time, this was akin to getting a daily bout of measles or flu or something. I had to play sports I didn’t choose or like in the middle of the day, getting all sweaty, and then I had to go do more school after that. Some of my P.E. teachers were stellar human beings. Others were… not. One of those others happened to be a football coach who liked to make inappropriate comments to young female students such as myself. This same coach wrote me up for saying a bad word after getting kicked in the shins playing soccer. Girls were not supposed to swear. I spent many early mornings before school running laps to offset that bad report and save my grade, so I had plenty of time to ruminate on the unfairness of it all—the boys didn’t get written up for swearing. I guess I built some character? I definitely hardened my resolve to smash the patriarchy, even if I didn’t know what that exactly was when I was fourteen.
I am not saying that we should all be dropping F-bombs all over the place. Context is important in swearing as in everything. What I am saying is that the occasional swear word is good for the soul. In fact, actual research has found that swearing reduces our sensation of pain. What could be more useful in a workout than that?
Workouts are not tea parties. We do not have to be perfect ladies and gentlemen while we work out (even though we do have to have good gym etiquette—we are not barbarians!). If a good cuss word gets us through to a personal best, that’s f-ing awesome.
Today we have permission to love our workouts or to hate them. In other words, we get to feel however we feel.
When we’re doing something really hard and it isn’t going super well and we’re tired and grumpy, it’s good to remember that we don’t have to like the process of what we’re doing. We certainly need to work out, but we don’t need to add pressure to ourselves to think it is the best thing ever all the time.
On the other hand, some folks really want us not to like our workouts. (This is not their business, but this does not stop them.) For their own reasons, they seem to need us to hate the gym or weights or exercise generally or whatever. Ignore them. We have permission to have fun at Zumba or on our bike or doing a personal record lift.
Workouts are enough work all by themselves. We don’t need to add a bunch of emotional work on top. Really.
One thing I get from doing my continuing education courses is new variations on exercises. This week, we’re doing round lunges, but instead of just lunging front, side, and back, we’re adding the diagonals (lunge front, lunge diagonal front, lunge side, lunge diagonal back, lunge back, lunge diagonal back across, lunge front diagonal across). It’s a lot of directional change, but it’s practical for life, which doesn’t always move the way we expect. Three rounds.
db circles | 30 |
bench press | 20 |
round lunges | 10 |
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mountain climbers | 30 |
flies | 20 |
pushups | 10 |
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squat to leg lift | 30 |
rows | 20 |
brains | 10 |
Unless we are dead, we are eating something at least occasionally. Eating is natural. It’s essential! And yet, somehow, I still feel like I need to remind us all that we have permission to eat. Here are some things we are allowed:
1. Vegetables. The more, the merrier! Eat as many colors as possible! Eat them in salads, soups, on the side, on top, or underneath.
2. Fruits. Whole is better, but juice is ok, too.
3. Protein foods. What these are vary by human. It’s good to choose lean proteins and maybe a fair amount of plant-based protein for optimal health.
4. Treats. Yes: we are allowed treats. We just need to remember that they are sometimes foods.
