Thursday List: 7

Because there are so many kinds of movement out there, here are some general ideas about kinds of movement we might want to try:

 

1.     Outside:  walking, hiking, running, kayaking, skiing, swimming, frisbee golf, tennis, pickleball, rollerblading, etc.

2.     Teams:  baseball, softball, football, hockey, soccer, field hockey, basketball, etc.

3.     Solo:  running, biking, swimming, skiing, gym machines

4.     Mindful:  yoga, Pilates

5.     Heavy:  lift, lift, lift!

6.     Classes:  Zumba, aerobics, HIIT, core, TRX, etc.

7.     Lifestyle:  housework, gardening, dog-walking, kid-wrangling, etc.

Movement, Part 2

Yesterday I talked a little about the difference between movement and exercise.  We may want to start with movement and dip into exercise later, but we might have some beliefs that hold us back from doing either one.  Let’s talk about some of those and see if we really need to keep those beliefs.

We might think that movement has to be hard or painful to be effective.  I personally would like to have words with the person who came up with “no pain, no gain.”  Pain is an important message from our bodies that we are doing something potentially dangerous.  We do not want pain while we are moving.  In fact, doing some moving can help us reduce the amount of pain we have in our bodies. 

 

(I’m not going to lie and say that all exercise is always super duper fun and never ever uncomfortable because that’s just not true.  Discomfort is not the same as pain.  Our hamstrings will pretty much always complain when we do hamstring curls.  I will always hate lunges.  But, in general, most of the time movement and exercise should be somewhere between tolerable and great.)

 

We might think that we have to join a gym and figure out all those weird machines and fling dumbbells and make grunting noises to get in our movement or exercise.  Nope.  Things like dancing count.  Half an hour of tag is a great way to move.  Team sports count.  So do swimming and skiing and hiking.  Gardening definitely counts as movement, and, depending on what we’re doing, may be exercise, too.

 

We might think that we have to be good at whatever movement we do.  I can say for a fact that I am a terrible swimmer.  And I don’t care.  I love swimming.  My swimming counts as movement. 

 

A related belief might be that people will make fun of us for being bad at whatever we are doing or for how we look while we do it.  I can’t promise that people will always be kind, but I can say that most people are too busy worrying about their own stuff to pay much attention to anybody else.  Also, blowing off jerks probably counts as movement.  And do we really want the Mean Girls and Boys out there to keep us from feeling good?  Don’t let them win!  (Please note:  gym anxiety is real and serious.  It is totally all right for us to prefer to move by ourselves in private either forever or until we build up the confidence that we need to move with other people.)

 

Perhaps there is a theme here and that is:  there are lots and lots of ways to move.  It’s a fair bet that most of us will be able to find some kind of movement that we don’t hate.  I’m also willing to bet that all of us will feel better when we do make the effort to move, even just a little bit.  Experiment!

Movement, part 1

Over the summer, I worked on a certification as a Wellness Coach.  It is not surprising that movement is an important aspect of wellness and one that plays well with what I already know and do.  However, movement for wellness is a little different than what I usually do with my personal training and Pilates clients.  I’m going to explore what wellness-directed movement looks like in my posts this week.

 

The basic distinction I want to make is between movement and exercise.  Movement is the larger category and includes exercise, but you don’t have to do exercise to get moving.  One way to think about the two is that often exercise has a particular goal—to improve strength or cardio, to get more flexible.  Movement is a little more free-floating.  A stroll around the block at a leisurely pace is movement, but it may or may not be exercise, depending on the level of fitness of the walker in question.

 

Movement is really good for us.  Our bodies work better when we move them and our brains do, too.  I know there are a lot of us who don’t like exercise, whether it’s because we had a terrible experience in gym class or because we think it has to involve giant weights and big sweaty guys or any of a million other reasons.  But movement can be as simple as dancing around the kitchen with the kids when our song comes on, or taking the dog around the block, or challenging your partner to see which one of you can slide farther down the hall in socks.

 

Especially when we’ve been best friends with the couch for a long time, it’s important to realize that any movement, even a quick stand-up stretch between meetings, will help us.  We may find that we want to move on to exercise eventually or we may not, but we’ll be better for the effort.

Monday Workout: Triceps

We all want to have lovely triceps, right?  Bench dips are a good way to work on that goal.  Three rounds.

 

squat raise	30
deadlift	20
bench dip	10
kb alt arm swing	30
kb hammer curl	20
kb halo	10
1 arm clean and press	30
rows	20
pretty princesses	10

Monday Workout: Sorry (Not!)

It’s been a while since we did plain old squats, but they remain my favorite exercise.  Sorry/not sorry about the burpees.  Three rounds.

 

1 min cardio
mountain climbers	30
rows	20
burpees	10
squats	30
pushups	10
brains	10

 

Monday Workout: So Much!

We have a lot going on this week.  So many compound exercises!  They’re good for burning calories, boosting metabolism, and improving coordination.  Three rounds.

 

step ups	30
lunge to twist	20
quadruped lateral raise	10
squat to leg lift	30
bench press	20
reverse fly	10
woodchoppers	30
flies	20
V sit press	10

Monday Workout: Two!

Balance and a little plyometrics, what’s not to like?  (Well, if plyometrics are not for you, substitute as needed…)  Three rounds.

 

skater jump	30
flies	20
renegade rows	10
tap backs	30
1 leg deadlifts	20
1 leg squats	10
suitcase swings	30
skullcrushers	20
Russian twist	10