Joe Knows...

One of the fun things about my work is that I get to try stuff out on myself.  I get to experiment for fun and it turns out useful!  This month’s experiment is a commitment to doing yoga daily.  As of this post, I’m about halfway through.  It has been instructive.

 

Not surprisingly, I’m feeling (slightly) more flexible (I’m never going to be all that flexible—it’s not my gift) and like I have some new mobility in my joints.  Which has made me work really hard on my stability.  Suddenly my arms and legs are going in directions I don’t expect!  Chaos!  Wobbling!

 

Oh, right.  I have deep muscles on purpose.  They’re for controlling all that chaos and creating balance.  Tuning in to what is happening on the inside helps bring order to the outside.  What a concept!

 

I’m also appreciating the way that Pilates and yoga can work together.  There are plenty of poses that are not available to my body at the moment, and may never be truly possible for me, but Pilates tools can scaffold the skills for me so I can continue to approximate my way to greatness.

 

Pilates certainly can scaffold way more than yoga.  The refinements it encourages to overall movement patterns can benefit pretty much every other kind of movement.  That Joe was a smart guy.

Play (out of) that funk...

Sometimes we have days that just don’t go right.  Maybe we ate something that disagreed with us, or the dog barked at every cat and squirrel all night, or we were out of coffee and we don’t seem to be able to get out of the funk.  It might not seem like it, but exercise will probably help.

 

Caveats:  I do not recommend working out when we are actually sick.  I do not suggest doing anything super challenging when we are having issues with focus.  We ALWAYS need to use our good judgment about what is appropriate for us to do and sometimes that includes hiding under the covers.

 

Now that that is out of the way, here is why exercise might help.  There are the mood-elevating benefits of cardio that I’m always banging on about (because they are REAL!).  There is the character-building thing that comes with doing the responsible and good-for-us task even when we don’t feel a lot like it.  But one possibly overlooked good reason to work out is that it is a finite thing.  We show up, we do the thing, and then we are done, feeling tired, but also virtuous and maybe even slightly more in control of at least some small part of the universe.  This is not something to be sneezed at in our current unpredictable world.

 

Go play.  It will help.

Monday Workout: Choice!

This week, we have choices.  Fine.  We have choices every week.  But this week, I will not be telling anybody what to do, but rather providing options for everyone to make their own workout taking into account their own bodies and the tools on hand.  The format is the usual 30-20-10 in which there are three sets of three exercises making up one round; we do three rounds.  To make up a set of exercises, choose one from the 30 column, one from the 20 column, and one from the 10 column.  I suggest choosing the 10 from the ab exercises after the space in the 10 column in the third set, but I certainly will not be looking over anyone’s shoulder to see what got picked!  Have fun!

 

Choice Workout: Choose three from each column
30	20	10
woodchoppers	squats	med ball rescues
mountain climbers	lunges	round lunges
jacks	deadlifts	lateral raise
plank jacks	bench press	skullcrushers
jump squats	fly	YTA
jump lunges	row	pushups
ball slams	kickback	burpees
overhead high knees	curls
opposite knees	reverse fly
clean and press
1 arm clean and press		Russian twist
		pretty princesses
		brains
		femur arcs
		quadruped
		roll out abs

Change it up!

If we do the same workout or the same kind of workout all the time, not only do we get bored, our bodies stop adapting.  Here are six ways to change things up:

 

1.     Do it faster.  We can make the whole workout at a faster pace, or we can add bursts of speed to our cardio or weight workout.  The body gets surprised, the brain has to work a bit more, and everyone is tired and happy at the end!

2.     Make it unstable.  We can do whatever it is we’re doing on a BOSU, stability ball, turntable, squishy mat.  We can work one side of the body at a time.  We can try standing on one leg and then the other.  Sometimes it’s as simple as running on the beach where the sand is not nearly as regular as the surface of the treadmill.  Instability recruits our core more.  We have to concentrate.  We learn stuff!

3.     Put it in water.  This can be a literal adaptation, as in we can do water walking or water running or water aerobics instead of land walking, running, or aerobics, or we can just try swimming as a switch from our usual cardio.  One of the great things about swimming is that it compels us to consider the breath, which is essential to our wellbeing.

4.     Switch teachers.  Sure, we are comfortable in that yoga/spin/bootcamp/Zumba/Tabata class.  We’ve been taking it every Thursday for a year now.  Comfortable, for the body, is an invitation to avoid change, growth, and development.  See what a different play list or series of exercises does to wake up body and mind.

5.     Try our friends’ workouts.  Maybe our buddy has been going on and on about that amazing bike ride.  Maybe she’ll shut up if we just try it.  And maybe it will, in fact, be just as amazing for us.  Or maybe another friend loves yoga.  Get him to take you along.  Worst case, you get to hang out with a friend.

6.     Take it outside.  Or inside.  If we always work out indoors, we could use a little fresh air.  If we’ve been outside so much that we’re functionally feral, maybe we could enjoy the air conditioning for a bit.

 

As always, be safe and have fun.

Experiment!

I end up in a lot of conversations about fitness.  It’s an occupational hazard, or it would be if I didn’t actually enjoy it.  As it is, I learn things about how people view the whole fitness process.

 

Recently, I have been having a lot of chats with people who think they should be doing more exercise.  They say it like a lot of people talk about how they probably should get a colonoscopy.  I am sure that there are people somewhere for whom there is not one single form of exercise that is the least bit fun, but nearly everyone can find something to do that is both enjoyable and beneficial to the body.

 

It might take more than one try to figure out what that activity might be.  People who like to be outside are probably not going to bond with hot yoga, but skiing might be exactly the right sport for them.  Carpal tunnel syndrome and rock climbing are not a match made in heaven, but a more leg-intensive activity like roller-blading might be just the thing.  Someone might imagine that getting sweaty is the very worst thing about exercise until they hit that club with the awesome music and dance all night long.

 

We do not have to commit to that one true exercise for life.  In fact, that’s almost always a bad idea because it causes us to overuse some parts of our bodies and underuse other parts.  We might want to consider commitment to experimentation instead—it can be a lot of fun.

Cardio is our friend

Perhaps I am repetitive.  I am okay with that because we often need to hear something a whole bunch of times before it sinks in and makes sense.

 

If we have only a limited attention span or time allotment for exercise, the very first thing we should choose is to do cardio.  This is especially true when things are stressful and it seems like we should not be wasting our time with something as frivolous as exercise.

 

Cardio is pretty much the best stress-buster I know.  It gives us a positive outlet for nervous energy.  It boosts our mood.  It burns calories, improves our lipid profile, helps us sleep better, and helps us concentrate when we’re done.  Also, there are a lot of ways to get cardio in and a whole bunch of them are free.

 

Consider yourself invited to walk, run, dance, swim, bike, rollerblade, skip, or climb stairs.  Chase the dog or the kid.  Anything that gets the heart rate up and makes us breathe heavy counts (if you choose an NC-17 activity, please make sure you get consent and you take appropriate precautions).

 

Go play.  It’s a good thing.

Monday Workout: More body weight

Since we are still not at the part where gyms get to reopen, we get a body weight circuit again this week.  Do three or four rounds…

 

mountain climbers	30
lunges	30
plank jacks	10
windmills	30
1 leg deadlifts	10
side lunges	20
quadruped	10
V sit	hold 30 sec