Motivation

First, a reminder… drink plenty of water! Yes, it’s a little goofy, but I took the picture to prove to Woobie that I was drinking my water today.

 

 

Things I didn’t want to do today:

• Wake up on time
• Go to work
• Go to the gym

Things I did today:

• Got out of bed mostly on time
• Went to work (was actually a pretty good day)
• Went to the gym

After dealing with mild stomach cramps, a long day at work, and allergies, I really didn’t want to go to the gym after work today… especially since I was there until 5pm. I considered going for a walk down by the creek but it was just too hot out there. I was going to claim ‘Gotta clean, can’t hit gym’ but just before leaving work I found my sansa cases and armbands had come. That was all I needed to get my butt to the gym. New toy time! So, was the trip to the gym worth it? Sure was. Did some elliptical, then weights and stretching. I may have overdone a little on the stomach twisty thing I did, back popped quite a bit, which felt good but the stress might not have been that great for my already taxed lower back.

 

Motivation can sometimes be something that is just outside out grasp, taunting us with its nearness. So, where does one find it? As I mentioned earlier, it was a new toy for me today. Sometimes it can be a buddy to go work out with. The problem with that, gotta find a buddy that is really into it and will motivate you. If you both blow it off, no one gets motivated, and that sort of defeats the purpose. So, what about a reward system? Have to be careful with this one. Most of us have the mindset of ‘I did good.. gimmie cookie!’ thanks to childhood. Sure, we also got gold stars, cute pencils, time with a special toy, but more often than not, it was an edible treat. New clothes are always a nice option, but when you’re working out, you sort of have to wait on needing smaller clothing. Pair of shoes? That can get dangerous and expensive. You could give yourself gold stars, to add up to something, but that kind of works better when someone else keeps track of it unless you have some killer determination. Then again, when you have killer determination, you tend to not really need a motivator. For some people, a combo of motivational tools is necessary. This blog post sets things out in a nice easy to follow pattern that is far better than my mind dump ramble.

 

As I’ve been writing this, I’ve been chuckling to myself. See, the whole reason I’m going through all of this, and pushing myself, etc, is because I’ve signed up for a 5k in August. If you read Leo’s post, number 22 is to sign up for a race. Even that knowledge wasn’t really enough to make me feel good about going to the gym today. I kept saying in my head, I’ve got plenty of time to train, no worries. I know better than that with the shape I’m in aerobically. I’ve never been all that great in that department. Weights, sure, aerobics, not so much.

Time to change that :D

 

In other news, my knees seem to be behaving after working out today. Yay!

 

This is a two picture post btw… here’s a post-workout picture.

Knees at it again

So it was mildly crazy at work yesterday and I happened to wear pretty tall heels. Now this would normally not be much of an issue, but with the heat my feet were a wee bit swollen which caused issues to begin with. Add to that my rapid pace of movement. What did this oh so lovely combo cause? Gold star to those who said ‘knee pain’! Feels like the knee cap isn’t quite in place, like it needs to pop or something or like something’s pulling funny. Add to that the head pain I’m dealing with either from allergies, being dehydrated, or who knows what and I want to curl up and wait things out. Instead I’m trying to stretch things out and relax a bit in the hopes that things get back to livable.

 

Through all this I have come to a few conclusions, one of them being, I miss ritual. I used to do quite a bit of meditation, etc. Somewhere along the way that all fell aside. I belong to a local liberal church but that isn’t doing it lately. Theory I’m playing with is that if I add that sort of activity back in, I’ll be able to .. I don’t know. It’s something to play with.

Working Out Sick

It’s often tricky to make the call… work out while fighting something off, or curl up in bed. Ok, so some times it isn’t really that tricky. If you can’t move, you can’t work out. But, what happens when you’re right on the cusp of being almost that sick? That was me yesterday. I woke up feeling crummy, wanted to just stay in bed, but had things I needed to get done like dishes, buying cat food, etc… so I got out of bed. I think I had overdone it the night before when I had attacked the vines growing on the back patio. That had to be done however… was a pretty good work out too. Sun was out, slight breeze, cats playing. Anyway, I woke up quite sore after that. I had been sore since Friday though so it likely just didn’t help any. After a shower, and brushing my teeth, I felt almost human again and decided to go for a walk with some jogging thrown in to see how my knees took it. Huzzah! The knees are ok. The rest of me, not so happy. My lungs have apparently decided that they were allowed to relax during my long rest. If it’s not one thing, it’s another eh? Feeling much better today.. was a little sore earlier but that seems to have worked itself out for the most part. Hopefully the trend continues.

Kick in the Butt

Every now and then, a person needs a kick in the butt to get moving… I was at that point this week. The fair kicked my butt and I have been just floating along this past week. I did go for a hike with a dear friend on Saturday, but past that, not much has been done in the way of exercise. I had planned to just deal with the laundry and be done for the night, but then watched the recent episode of Loosing It with Jillian Michaels… it gave me the kick in the butt I needed.  The woman on the show had lost her husband and it sent her into a world of topsy turvey, screw it. By the end of the show, after working out for a month and training, she hobbled through a 5K.

 

I’ve got a 5K coming up in a couple months… so, I got off my butt and on the Wii. Got some good sweat therapy in and think I may try and get up early tomorrow to go walk… The good news is, my knees didn’t hurt after the hike on Saturday, but my legs were jelly lol. I suppose that’s what I get for hiking in flip flops after being on my feet all day.

 

It’s been tough lately to eat well… I’ve been doing a pretty good job of it but now and then, not so hot. I try and play mind games with myself, saying I’m having gum or fruit ‘for dessert’ rather than ‘instead of dessert’ but it gets old. It’s tough after years of eating things that I now know, aren’t all that great for me. We’re conditioned to seek out sweets, fats, etc… it’s in our genetic makeup. At one point, those things were scarce, and so we had to find them,. Now, they are everywhere and easier to get than the things that our bodies need. The tables have turned, and yet, we haven’t evolved to a point where our minds and bodies understand that. The complex, the colorful, the fresh, these are the things that our bodies are now crying out for in various forms of health issues. Some people have caught up with this new concept, they snub their noses at a slice of cake in favor of a fresh pear. Perhaps, one day, I’ll discover their trick. Until then, I shall keep kicking myself in the butt!

Whoops

So, I missed a day of posting.. it happens. I did work out yesterday, did some wii time. Today I was pretty sore but went to the Y with my mom after work. It was a very long day and I needed to let it go. I also won’t have much time this weekend to work out since the Fair is going on. So aside from hauling my massage table around and standing all day there won’t be much energy for much else. I’m looking forward to the weekend, despite the exhaustion of it all. I don’t really have much else to say for tonight… Sorry for the brief blog but not every day can be very thought provoking.

Surprise Morning Quote

Had this in my inbox today…

Anything is possible, but you have to believe and you have to fight.
Lance Armstrong

Sweat Therapy

Plan was to hit the pool for aerobics but I wasn’t feeling it after work. My body hurt, I was tired, and just wanted to curl up on the couch. So I did… after chopping onions and getting the beef stuff I made going. Did I feel guilty? No. Now and then we need to listen to our bodies. I don’t mean the mind games we play with ourselves when we’re just being lazy. I also didn’t just sit on the sofa the whole evening, but long enough to recover from whatever was going on. After dinner had settled enough, I fired up the wii. It had been a while since I’d done anything on there but weigh myself. After some boxing, I decided to try and jog in place for a while… I managed to keep it up for ten minutes, which got me close to 1.5 miles of wii running, then some arm extension things.

 

While I was jogging I started to think back on things as well as forward on things. I decided to picture myself actually jogging the 5K while doing it. This helped me continue on rather than pause for a moment. Thinking back I started to think back on what I used to do when I had a long/busy day and needed to unwind. I would sit on my tush and play some kind of shooting game, or just watch TV for the evening. Doesn’t really let anything out. A friend and I are always talking about ‘Sweat Therapy’. This is just the act of being physically active in some form of exercise, and sweating out the blech of the day. It’s quite effective at that, as well as energizing when you’re just feeling kind of tired and down. It’s sometimes tough to remember that wearing yourself out, can energize and revitalize you.

 

If my knee is doing ok, maybe I’ll go walk after work tomorrow, we shall see!