I won’t bore you with the details of my desire to get back into shape right now except to say that I used to regularly do yoga and pilates then I sprained my ankle last March and have basically allowed that to be my excuse to be lazy ever since. I’m trying to get out of lazy mode and I’m starting with trying to find good free online videos for twenty minute ab workouts. I’ll just go from there. I started today and here’s the one that I used:
It seems like a nice basic routine and I think I’ll stick with it for another day or two or until whenever I get bored with it and want to find another one.
Like many people, I have a love/hate relationship with exercise. When I do it regularly, I feel good and I like that. When I don’t do it regularly, I can’t remember what I liked about it and I have to drag myself back to it kicking and screaming. (Actually, kicking and screaming isn’t really accurate because that would be much more active. I suppose that I have to drag my body out of bed as it resists by slumping into a heavier and heavier state!)
Of course, the trick is to find exercise that you truly enjoy doing. And I do have that. In particular, I like hiking. I also like other active, strength building things like indoor rock climbing and pilates mat classes. Unfortunately I just can’t make these things happen on a regular enough basis for them to be my sole form of exercise. I need more cardio in my life in order to feel good.
So what I’d really like to do is find a way to make exercising at home more fun. Home-based exercise is great because it doesn’t require any preparation, it works in any weather and you can fit it in between work and social networking and watching TV and whatever else you’re already doing at home. There are certainly drawbacks to home-based exercise and I definitely don’t think it could be my only exercise option either but combined with out-of-the-house activities it offers a well-rounded exercise option.
In theory. The problem is that it’s tough to find a home-based workout that I can actually get enthusiastic about. It’s easy to start one and then halfway through it decide that I’m done for the day – a huge flaw of the home-based workout. So, in an effort to get excited about exercise again, I decided to try a dance workout with Barbie.
The truth is that I love silly campy things. I love retro things that were sort of kind of cool when they first came out and are now just totally ridiculous. They make me laugh. And if you can laugh while you’re working out then you can enjoy what you’re doing, getting many more benefits than you would get with just straight gritting-your-teeth-through-it kind of exercise.
So I turned on this 30 minute video thinking that the silliness of it would at least get me excited about moving and being active in my home. It’s supposed to be for ages 6 and up so I didn’t expect a major workout. Boy was I wrong! Although the exercises themselves aren’t tough in the way that holding a yoga pose or climbing a mountain is tough, I found it nearly impossible to keep up with the dance moves of the Barbie instructor. How the kids on the video learned those dance exercises is beyond me.
But the truth is that it worked. It made me laugh. And I got most of the way through the video before I gave up on it, did some crunches and quit my home workout for the day.
What do you do to workout in a way that you actually enjoy?
Last month I wrote a post here about hiking shoes. I was talking about how difficult it was for me to find hiking shoes. I actually ended up getting two pairs a few weeks ago but I haven’t had a chance to test them out yet. I’ll have to come back and let you know more about them when I do test them out. I’m hoping to get out on the trails this weekend but there are no plans set in stone for that yet.
In any case, in the original article I mentioned a company that makes hiking shoes – Webtogs. At the time, I was looking at their Berghaus brand of shoes. They recently sent me a link to a video that pointed out something else that I might need – a lightweight jacket.
Anyone who knows me knows that I don’t like wearing layers. I originally come from the Arizona desert where the idea of wearing layers was just plain foreign to me. My main goal was to take off as many layers as possible! I lived in tank tops and light denim jeans. Now I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and that means that I have to wear layers. I’ve adjusted but I still don’t like it.
That’s why my attention was caught by this particular product. Supposedly the jacket (called the Marmot Mica Jacket) is so lightweight that it barely even feels like a jacket. I own several jackets but none of them are particularly lightweight. And I don’t own one that’s good for hiking. According to the video (which you can watch below) the jacket is made with a unique material that is waterproof and breathable while still being lightweight. Looks interesting.
I’m probably never going to be someone who goes to the gym regularly. I just don’t enjoy hanging out on exercise machines even if it might be good for me. I’m the kind of person who has to enjoy my exercise or I’m not going to be able to do it.
Luckily, over the years, I’ve found several types of exercise that I actually enjoy. Last fall I discovered yoga (and more recently pilates) which I go to a few times a week. The combination of spirituality and exercise seems to really work for me there. I also like getting out into nature and enjoy hiking. I’ve done indoor rock climbing in the past and would love to try outdoor rock climbing one day. I think if you find exercises that you like such as these then you’ll naturally just stay in shape because you’ll enjoy working out.
In addition to learning to enjoy exercise, I’ve learned to enjoy reading and writing about exercise. I read a few fitness blogs and yoga magazines. Three recent articles that I wrote about exercise were:
10 Trampoline Exercises. Working out on a trampoline is so much fun. I wish I could get one but it’s not feasible in my apartment at this time.
Foot Gymnastics. There are lots of workouts for the feet and toes. These are particularly good for anyone who has a problem with flat feet.
How to Burn Calories. Did you know that you don’t even have to exercise to burn calories? There are other things you can do as well.
Those were all fun articles to research and write about. Hopefully they’ll be fun for you to read as well.
