Category: I Work Out

Said in the key of LMFAO

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I Work Out

Make Your Relationship With Gym Work Out

It’s the time of year when a lot of people make a commitment to their physical health. I get giddy about it for every one of them whether I know them or not. There can be some barriers to gym success though. These are some things that have helped me tell those barriers to kick rocks. Maybe some of these will work for you.

Research: Talk to someone who you think understands you and your goals. Or maybe someone who’s got a fitness level you’d like to have. You can meet with a trainer, or just capitalize on the knowledge of others.

Set an Attaintable Goal: The goal should be something that you can sustain and measure based on your own progress. Example: “I’m going to get in 3 workouts a week” is going to be far more powerful than “I’m going to work my ass off to lose 20 pounds.” Consistency is FAR more important than intensity. If you had a super hard workout, but then can’t move for a week you are really working against your goals. But….

Push Yourself: As I “mature” I’m coming to realize that not everyone wants my opinion. I keep this in mind when I see someone that I know can lift more. It doesn’t come from a place of judgment. It’s more “I wish they knew they are stronger than they think.” Some day someone will ask me if I think they can add weight to their hip thrust and I’ll be like, “Oh my gosh!!!! I thought you’d never ask…! Absolutely you can. I didn’t think I could until I actually did it too! Let’s go chase some goals.” Until that day, I’ll just remember that my job is to worry about me. And one of the things that makes me worry is when I’ve left the gym wondering if I could have done more. I hate that feeling soooooo bad. My hack is to remember that I can always take weight off the bar/machine.

You Belong there Just as Much as Anyone Else: If you’ve not seen me walk around like a silverback ape, I’d be happy to show you. I’m pretty sure I can curl my lip and grunt to gain access to things I want to use at the gym. Once a potential member was being given a tour. “It’s the elusive woman in the free-weights room” was how I was described. My place in there is secure. But I used to be scared to death to be in there. That’s normal, but it gets easier the more you go. Also, weight room populations change rapidly. A room could look completely full but in 10 minutes be completely empty and it’s not always because someone farted. If you can’t find a thing you want to do, maybe walk the treadmill a few minutes then circle back. Or, you could always just fart.

No One is Judging You: It’s easy to feel self conscious when new at the gym. You can feel like all eyes are on you. Maybe some are because you’re hot, enjoy that. But for the most part, gym folks are there to work on themselves. “But what if I’m not doing the thing right?! They’re going to laugh.”

  1. They probably won’t notice
  2. You can always tell them your trainer told you to do it differently
  3. They’re genuinely excited to see people working on themselves
  4. If they are that one in a million judgy-judgerton, they are so wrong their opinion isn’t worth your energy. Not in the slightest. But if you encounter them, tell me who they are so I can go straight silverback ape on them.

Headphones are Your Friends: They can be the universal symbol for “I’m not here to chat.” Likewise, when someone peels off one of her giant Beats headphones, you can be sure she’s going to try to engage you in listening to some story about her kids. (It’s me. I’m “someone.”). There is some sign language to learn, but it’s worth it for the uninterrupted time to work out. Signs such as “you using that?” and “naw bro, it’s yours” come natural after just a few tries. Don’t feel like you need to blast music in those headphones. You can even have them on without music at all.

Accountability Matters: You gotta say out loud what your intentions are. And you should have people who will track those with you. The most consistent I ever got with working out was when I was carpooling. I didn’t want to text Stefanie that I just “wasn’t feeling it.” That would be embarrassing. You want someone that you don’t want to have to look in the eye and tell them you didn’t go because you had *insert excuse here* again. Someone who’s going to say, “Man, that’s too bad that your bicep hurts. How was your cardio? Because your ass still should have been there moving in some way.” If you don’t have that person, I’m happy to be it.

Be Honest: With others and with yourself. There’s a great sign at Crossfit that says “the body keeps an accurate reflection regardless of what you write down.” You know how there’s no point in lying to the dental hygienist about how frequently you floss because she can absolutely see? Same holds true for working out. You can’t lie about it. Your health will rat you out every time.

Just Move: You’re not going to get the perfect workout every time. Someone will be on the thing you wanted, or you’ll have a sore spot, or maybe you’ll have to leave early to get the kids; but any movement counts. Seriously, it’s worth it to go there for 20 minutes because that’s 20 minutes you wouldn’t have got if you stayed home.

Wait Until You’re at Gym Before Deciding if You Don’t Want to Go: So many times I’ve not wanted to go for one completely valid reason or another. I try to at least get there and give it a couple minutes before I dip out. Invariably, I’m happy I went. “Exercises gives you endorphins. Endorphins make people happy. Happy people don’t shoot their husbands. They just don’t.” (Legally Blonde, not my words)  

Be Ready With Options: It’s important to have a game plan when going to the gym, but be ready to regroup if needed. This fine Thick Thigh Thursday, I was planning to do some good mornings on the Smith rack. My goal was to work the spot at the bottom of my butt, and the top of the back of my leg. Some mountain of a man got to the machine before me. Luckily for my butt, I knew that a Bulgarian split squat would be a reasonable alternative. There is always another option or a modification for any muscle you want worked. Always.

Know Your Muscles: You don’t need MD level anatomy knowledge, but you can target your workouts better if you know your muscles. You can maybe even choose a favorite muscle. I can’t, but maybe you can (traps/delts/lats). Once you know the muscles….

Do MORE Research: If you see me on my phone at the gym, I may be trying to find just the right Justin Bieber jam for my work, or I may doing one of my favorite kinds of google searches; “muscles worked in (whatever exercise).” I look at the pictures and then ask myself if it seems like I’m using the muscles I’m supposed to work. This works great to help me correct my form or to create mind/muscle connection. Or I google things such as “alternatives to the good morning because that behemoth is on the machine I want.” It seems silly, but it’s really incredibly helpful. If you peek around, you may see that others are doing the same things on their phones.

Don’t Depend of the Scale: Weights fluctuate, and as we get fit, we may not lose weight. Look at other measures like the aforementioned tracking your number of workouts. Or getting a body composition analysis. Many gyms have these. Nutrishop in Redding has one that anyone can use free of charge. They give you a number that more important than weight; your percentage of body fat. They are easy to do, and super fun. You’ll learn the estimated weight of your right leg (in addition to all your extremities.)

Consistency: Things will get in the way. They always do. But just keep chipping away. If you do, there absolutely will be a moment when working out is the something you genuinely want to do. If you have a bad week/month, don’t let it saddle you. You wouldn’t slash your other 3 tires if you got a flat, why would you stop a lifestyle change goal because of a chunk of time that didn’t go as planned. Slow progress is still progress.

And most importantly,

Do What it Takes to Make it a Priority: Your health is important. For you and for the people around you. You’re not taking away from other important things to flippantly work out. You are improving your health so that you have more time for other important things. After the initial suck of making a new pattern, you will have more energy. You will sleep better. And you will feel good. Even it if feels like you’ve been bled completely dry, you will have no ragrets.

What other tips do you have? And, thanks for reading!

Categories
I Work Out Personal Growth (or not)

They Call Me Johnny Utah

“Did you have a spiritual awakening?”
“I didn’t want to, but there were muthafuck’n dolphins”

My expectations around the plan of trying to learn to surf hovered in more shallow conditions that the first few feet of ocean we walked out in to; maybe some cool stories, maybe some cool pictures, most importantly though a test of if I can. I very much enough being tested. So on those shallow premises; I booked a surf lesson to commemorate turning 50.

I’m not what you’d call a “water person.” I do love to be on my paddleboard, but I’m also quite certain I’ll drown if I swim more than 5 feet from the boat in the middle of the lake.

I know those people who are absolutely recharged by the very nearness of an ocean. I admire that, but for me that body of water is intimidating.

That coupled with the fact that I swim like a rock made it so there were a number of ways I thought the experience could suck out-loud.

The ethically motivated surf school guy called the day before the lesson, “We’re going to have to cancel tomorrow. The waves are expected to be pretty big, and there’s a dead whale on the beach.” Poor guy, he was genuinely trying to be helpful and all I could do was giggle. Of course there’s a dead whale blocking the adventure. We made plans for a different day. I thanked him, and wondered if maybe this adventure wasn’t meant to be.

As it turned out, there were no swarms of locusts or freak forest fires on the beach to get in the way when the day came.

The water was 61 degrees. Outside temperature was nearly the same. Being the bonafide lizard that I am, I was more than a little worried about if I’d be too cranky being cold to have fun.

We waited near the shipping container on the beach emblazoned with the name of the surf school. Corky Carroll. Anyone who knows anything about surfing knows the name Corky Carroll. So obviously, I knew absolutely nothing about him or his schools. Uncle Joe had recommended them, and since they’d already taken steps to try to improve our experience, I was a fan.

Two of the surfer-est looking young men I’d ever seen sauntered up to the container. They were the most chill. They had wild sun-bleached hair and smiles wider than the beach we stood near. Fine examples of young men. One of the fit handsome boys said his name was Logan. Before I though better of it I blurted “Of course it is.” I’m guessing his parents thought Thor or some other worthy name could have been a bit much. Maybe my weird comment is what got me paired up with not Logan, but Blair. A walking advertisement for sunscreen with his freckles and red hair as a legitimate surfer.

I was handed a wetsuit, and promptly felt already way out of my league. I’ve never put on a wetsuit. It felt a little bit like putting on those jeans that you know you should probably get rid of, but you hang on to the hope that someday you can wear them AND breathe.

There was lots of bustle in the container “bruh” “dude” “chill” “dope” etc.

Very few moments later we yarded our boards to the beach. Roughly 3 minutes of instruction later, it was time to go.

My heart was pounding out my neoprene covered chest.

Blair, in his voice that makes Bodhi from Point Break sound high strung, casually says, “You’ll want to step like this so you don’t get stung by the stingrays.”

“I’m sorry,…what the fuck did you say?!”

Yah. Stingrays. Spoiler alert, he was right. There were no sting ray attacks.

I very much appreciate the young men for just pushing the activity along. It made it so I had zero time to contemplate various outcomes of doom before we were paddling out.

Me. Paddling the fuck out. In the Ocean. On a surfboard! “Whoa.” (said in the key of Keanu Reeves)

Blair’s zen voice told me “paddle paddle paddle” as the first wave he’d selected for me to try came. I tried to stand. I failed. It happened so fast, I forgot to panic. The wave reminded me who was boss. I tossed around under it’s power, then popped up with a whole new attitude. Surf guy was looking for my response. I gave a big “wooooo!” He smiled and nodded his approval and I paddled back.

I failed on the second attempt too. But then I made the third one mine. The timing was right. I stood up in the proper spot on board, then mother nature gave me a ride. I definitely had a “holy shit,…I DID it” moment. I could see Uncle Joe watching from the beach. I could Brian and his extreme jealousy that I’d made it up before him (Okay, that may be an embellishment, but it’s my story. I’ll tell it how I like)

I wiped the enormous amount of snot from my smiling face and paddled back. “Man. I hope Uncle Joe got video of that.”

“Dude. You’re here for the experience, not the video” said my half-my-age zen master. I had another “whoa” moment.

He’s absolutely right. In just a couple words. Ginger Surf reminded me that that my purpose was to be still and enjoy what was happening. Maybe it’s because I’m 50 now, maybe it’s the Chris Rea I’m listening to, but just thinking of that moment I can be overcome with just great vibes.

Brian was eventually able to get up too. Our surf spirit guides worked even harder than us to make sure that we could get the best from our experience. At least once I was singlehandedly responsible for taking out all four of us. I nearly ran over several people. I rode a wave to the beach once. That’s frowned upon, but I didn’t know how to end it.

As we peacefully bobbed waiting to the wave for us, Logan called our attention behind us. A small pod of dolphins literally fucking frolicked in the waves. Blair said that he texted them and asked them to show. “Are you like that guy from The Boys?” I asked him. “The Deep? Tot…al…ly dude.” He grinned. Having seen the same Amazon show is maybe the only thing I had in common with surf guru. That and that he was about the age of my boys. But bless his little young heart, that didn’t stop him from killing it as my surf guy. He offered nothing but support, encouragement, and enough vibes for both of us.

The two hours were really more than incredible. There was such pure duality in the experience, working hard to sit back and let nature work you. Chaotic power and serenity meeting in the middle give such a feeling of peace and accomplishment.

I am already scheming about how to get back and go again.

Thanks for reading!

Categories
I Work Out Personal Growth (or not) Social Worky

Discipline-ish

Discipline. I need it. You need it. We all need it. And we all have some degree of it. And in an illustration of irony, I’ve wanted to blog about it for a minute; buuuuut just haven’t quite had the self-regulation to get it done. The cursor flashes at me; taunting, “What do you know about discipline?” You’re right cursor. There’s plenty of room for improvement for me on this one.

Anybody can do things when they’re easy. Maybe it’s new and exciting and so it doesn’t take much get you moving towards your goal. But then,…those damn walls and changing circumstances. That’s when you really get the benefit of being tested. Stolen internet quote of the week: good sailors are not made on calm seas. It’s not until things become inordinately difficult that we learn whether or not we have the needed amount of discipline. We have to be faced with the decisions about satisfying the “what you want now” vs. “what you want the most” to know how much restraint we have.

I could be wrong, but I thoroughly believe that discipline is a transferrable skill. Once a person develops those intrinsic means of self-discipline in one area; they are able to apply those skills to new goals. In looking at people who’ve accomplished pretty cool shit; they have a tendency to complete other pretty cool shit. Like the doctors and lawyers who are also black belts. Or the people in addiction recovery who now run marathons.

I very much do want to be more disciplined. I even read a book to learn more; the one by the writing guy/navy seal guy Jocko Willink. The book was a fun read. Each chapter charged with enough oomph and motivation that it felt like caffeine to the jugular. I would read and be like “YEA!!!!! That makes perfect sense! But also, ….now I kinda need a nap.” A theme that was a new to my undercooked brain was “discipline equals freedom.” It was counterintuitive. In general, I think of discipline as restrictive. But the words that my brain could only read in a yell made sense.

My interpretation was probably too social-workie, but how I understood it was that we learn where the boundaries are. Then it’s up to us to charge full steam towards them and get them to move. Test, and then be tested again. See how much progress we can make. What we can’t tolerate today; if we work at, maybe we can do tomorrow. There’s a great picture lots of us have probably seen with the horse obediently remaining tied to a plastic chair. The horse could totally shred the chair and get away, but in it’s horse brain, that chair is a limit they can’t surpass.

All our proverbial plastic chairs are different. But we can operate in the freedom of knowing that we are in control of how we react to the limits. (She said as she headed to the gym knowing it’s questionable if she’ll squat below parallel bwah ha!)

Thanks for reading!

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I Work Out Stories about my fam

“Your Mom Does Karate”

One day when dropping off the child formerly known as Derek at kindergarten, Ms. Barnes pulled me aside. “Derek keeps telling people his mom can beat up their parents.”

My eyes narrowed as I tried to decide the next right thing to say. I knew it probably wasn’t, “Well, tell me more about them” or “Maybe I can” or “If this is about that one dad with the blackeye,… he should’ve blocked.”

So instead, I tried to stifle my grin and assured her I would talk to him about it.

My first attempt at anything martial artsy was in my late 20’s. A buddy wanted to try kick boxing and wanted company. NOT cardio kickboxing. Kickboxing in a grungy looking gym that smelled exactly like you’d think the ones in the movies would smell.

I’d never hit or kicked anything before, nor had I tried to avoid being hit or kicked. It felt amazing. I loved everything from methodical hand wrapping to the sight of a bag moving in response to the effort put in to a kick or punch. It was the first time that I recall exercise being an incidental part of a bigger goal; things like “I’m going to practice with my jump rope so I can have more cardio conditioning.” There were layers of activity that were all novel and interesting.

Kickboxing was not a good match for the maternity years, so my interest was on hold a minute.

When the boys hit 4 and 2, I decided to look into martial arts again.

Enter Northwest Martial Arts. American Kenpo Karate with Sifu Alan Myrtle and his son, Nick.

I wasn’t totally sure if it was going to be for me. But after 7 years of training, I’m pretty sure it was exactly what I needed.

The early lessons had all the things that capture my attention; challenge me, humble me, give me opportunity to grow and improve. Everything was awkward; task after task that felt exactly like the first time you try to rub your stomach and pat your head. As each task was understood(ish), there was another task to challenge again.

The memories of it all quicken my heart to this day.

Bad day at work? Take it out on the bag.

Ever wondered what it feels like to be thrown to the ground? Wonder no more. And, oh MY! The feeling of throwing someone else to the ground…! Just like Cobra Kai, I learned how to “sweep the leg!” I also learned the ability to cause submission by the gentle act of an arm bar.

Want to go ham on a fellow classmate with wooden sticks? Put on the padded suit and the face cage and get to it. (That was an epic one. “You going to tell people you beat a Deputy with a stick?” “Yea. You going to tell people you beat a social worker with a stick?” “Yea.”)

Want to know how you’ll do under pressure? Belt test. I was so nervous from before each one. I’ve locked my keys in my vehicle a total of 3 times in my life. Two of those times were on the day of my first brown belt test. In case you’re wondering, I went as far as 2nd degree brown belt. In my system, there is only 2 more belts till. Black. (Close! But yet, so far!)

Want to know if you feel comfortable being an outlier? Stand alone at a tournament sign-in table with your 2 young children in tow. “Are both boys competing?” “Actually, it’s me.” Then later, right before you put in your mouthguard tell your little ones to listen to Beth, “I’ll be right back.” I loved the tournaments. A way test your skill against others. A favorite was when I’d won against both a mom and a daughter. Probably both with a stopping knife edge kick. It was kinda all I had.

Curious how it would be to have a decent black eye as a social worker? Wait for the bare knuckle sparring that comes from some of the tests. For days, people at such places as Wright Education (the biggest anger management game in town), Juvenile Hall, and Children’s Services all got to see that I didn’t block. (sigh!)

I was there long enough to see martial arts cause some unbelievable transformations for children. Long before I’d been taught about the importance of physical activity in relation to neurosequential modeling, I was able to just see kids blossom in martial arts. Shy kids found their voice with a kiai. Busy kids got to stimulate their bodies so their minds could soothe. They simultaneously learned confidence and humility. I also got to watch them grow both in their bodies and in their skills. That day when the person who was a kid now kicks your ass,…that day is a special one.

I gave it a go with my kids, but it didn’t stick. No matter how cool Karate is, it’s going to lose some of it’s vibe when it’s your mom’s jam. I may as well have signed them up for needlepoint.

Over the years, there’s been more than a few day dreams of me vanquishing some enemy with my sneaky karate skill.  I’ve never had to test them for real to know. But I do know what it feels like to get struck. Which is nice.

I’m incredibly grateful for my Karate time. I highly encourage anyone to look in to self-defense and martial arts for more reasons than I could list in 100 blogs. But when you do, make sure you tell you kids something very important. “Just because mommy comes home and brags about beating someone, doesn’t mean we can say it to the other kids in Kindergarten.”

Categories
I Work Out Personal Growth (or not)

The Pains in My Ass :)

It was sit up time. I can’t tell you how many months it’s been since I’ve done sit ups. Karen, the wise and kind, asked me if I wanted a mat for under my back. I declined.  And, that was my first mistake.

I sat up aggressively over and over. And consequently lost skin on my butt. It’s a thing that’s pretty normal, but that typically doesn’t become anyone’s business but your own.

My next fun mistake this week was to believe that I could do a workout with cleans at 115 pounds. Many folks can, but I am apparently not one of them.

Cleans are taking a barbell from the ground to up in front of your shoulders. It’s a lift that’s poetry in motion when done correctly. When I did it at that weight, it was more like a ransom note written by a 1st grader. I caught it ugly more than once. I ended up with a lovely green bruise on my chest, and a sucker punch of a pain in my left hip. Fine. My error for lifting with shit form, I’ll work around it, and it’ll be okay.

Three days later, I was doing deadlifts. The weight was not terribly heavy, 165 pounds. Things were going “old lady lifting” smooth until they really really weren’t. I was pulling the bar up, and the universe was like “naw bitch, sit down.” There was a pop in my hip. I crumbled, cussed, rolled out, and pared the weight WAY back so I could finish the workout.

But I was fine. I went outside later and tried some banded muscle ups. I was okay. I sat for 3 hours on a webinar training, and was fine-ish. Nauseous, and couldn’t get comfortable, but fine.

Then I did the craziest athletic thing yet for the week, I was (wait for it…) unloading my dishwasher. I bent over on my right leg. There was a sharp sensation, tingling, and the next thing I know, I was laying on the ground. I spent several minutes trying to get up, but I could not. This, and the pain, made me cry. I had a moment to inspect the underside of the cabinet and realized it needs to be re-finished. I made a mental note to get on that.

Finally, I realized I needed to call to my dear hearing-impaired husband who was watching TV on the other side of the kitchen. He’d heard nothing of my dramatic fall. I called. No answer. I tried to get up for a while more. I called again. I imagine that he had a moment of “did I just hear something?” before he came to the kitchen. His face told me he was worried, and I felt really bad for that.

While I thought that I’d be fine once I got off the ground, he made it clear that going to the ER was not a choice. He was taking me regardless of my protests.

The ER is weird right now, much like the rest of the world. He was not allowed in. I was left to myself, trying desperately to avoid COVID so people can’t have their satisfaction that I got it after going to the rodeo. But I was in so much fucking pain that I was touching everything as I writhed and wept.

Triage decided it was a sprain of my sacroiliac joint. The PA said it’s sometimes called the “sac” joint and I giggled because my sense of humor is that of a 14 year old boy (Deez nutz!). It should heal on its own without any major intervention. The plan was to address my pain. They were going to inject a muscle relaxer and an anti-inflammatory IN MY ASS THAT’S MISSING SKIN. Cool.

I’ve spent a lot of time over the years forming opinions about med seekers. I think the universe may have given me this awesome experience to help me expand my empathy on the subject. The nice nurse was understanding about my chapped butt and gave me the injections. I was “chilling” in the room for about an hour. I googled things such as “how long does it take for an IM muscle relaxer to make the pain stop” because I was still in a lot of pain. I looked like an alligator whose just taken prey as a I twisted and turned just trying to find a comfortable spot.

The guy came back and asked how I was doing. “I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, but I’m still hurting. I was expecting the shots to stop it.” I started to cry when he said that he was going to get morphine. “Have you ever had morphine before?” “Uh, I think so after I had a cesarean.” That shot stung like a mo-fo. I told him that there’s a bunch of calves that would have loved to see me stung by a shot. And then I told him the importance of seeing the rock walls out Ash Creek road. And then I felt better for several hours.

More humbling lessons came from the universe the next day when I went to fill my prescription for 12 pain pills and 15 muscle relaxers. The pharmacy clerk asked if I’d filled prescriptions there before. I thought I had, but I guess not. Apparently , this is a trigger for folks when getting pain medication. Another way she could have assessed the situation is that “maybe this chick doesn’t get medication often,” but naw. Maybe I was suspicious. After all, I have taken opiates in the past. In 1999. When I had a baby cut out of me!

 The lecture and judgment was unwarranted. And it got in my head. Am I med seeking? There’s no cool outcome to explain my pain. Like, I’m not having a baby or needing surgery. I’m thankful for the wisdom shared with me that it’s okay to take pain medication when there’s pain. Then I got angry at big pharma for creating circumstances where people feel like they have to question if someone really is having pain.

This week has been bursting with things that have been pains in my ass. Hopefully I’ll have learned some valuable lessons from this all and can put it all behind (oh!!!!) me.

If you hung in there, thanks for reading. 🙂

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I Work Out

The Essential Employee’s Guide to Essential Exercise

For folks who see exercise as a valuable part of their lives, and those who may even see it as a coping skill, being in a pandemic with gyms closed can be a huge challenge.

Here’s how I think we can maintain following the shelter in place orders, but still keep some exercise going.

Let’s start all the hours of our essential duties days with a little body movement. These can be done at your desk (make sure to keep safe social distancing).

There’s no need to dress out for these activities. The intent isn’t to get all sweaty, it’s just to get some body weight action continued.We’re reminding our bodies that they work for us, and that we will take care of them. Plus, it’s something like the apocalypse, it’s okay if we do sweat a lil.

All we need is maybe a towel so your hands don’t pick up and COVID 19 off the floor, and some willingness to look strange for exercising at your desk.

9:0020 Air Sqauts
10:0010 Burpees
11:0015 Push ups 
1:002 minutes of plank (break as often as needed, but accumulate 2 minutes)
2:0015 Tricep dips
3:0020 Leg lifts
4:0010 Lunges each leg
The Essentials Workout

 If you do this, it’s not lying to tell people you worked out all day. Adding some light cardio in your day will help with the stresses of all this, and will remind your body that this is break from the gyms, not a new way of being. I plan to walk or bike around my hood (6 feet from any others) for about 30 minutes a day.

If you’re thinking “Man. I’d like to do this, but I don’t want to seem weird doing this stuff at my desk,” remember that 3 weeks ago hoarding toilet paper was weird. Abnormal circumstances allow for abnormal responses. It’s totally okay to just bust out some burpees in times like these. Just remember to take off your lanyard. I know from experience that burpees will break our IDs.

If you need help on any of these moves, seek out a gym rat. Cyndi Code has done great burpee demonstrations in the quad. Am I right, Code?

Who’s down?

Categories
I Work Out Personal Growth (or not)

What’s Wrong With Being Confident?

It’s shortly after 6am on a Tuesday. I’ve got to be to work in a lil bit, but here I sit in my kitchen with hair dye on. I got drastic haircut last night and I can’t un-see that my dyed dark parts are in need of touch up. So there I go. Dying my hair before work. The unworthy pop song pops in my head “What’s wrong with being confident?” This. This and many other things are what’s wrong with being confident.

Normal people wouldn’t seize the moment between Crossfit and work to dye their hair. But, unnaturally self assured people will. Sure there’s benefits to self assuredness, but I’m a living example of some of the pitfalls to it as well.

“Yea. I bet I can do that.” This is the thought that pops in my head often before a number of questionable activities. This thought is regularly followed by reality checks that should curb my behavior. One time I thought I could scale a 6 foot fence with ease. There was no ease about it. It was ug-ly. Reasonable folk would be like, “Hmmm. I guess that’s not in my wheelhouse. Guess that’s okay because I have no need to scale fences.” Folks like me are more like, “I want to climb a fence again.” Why? There’s zero rationale for that thought.

I also get some reminders of my sharky presentation in a number of ways. Important person was at a meeting. I’d asked her if we’d met. She said that we had at a meeting that I’d ran about such and such. We’ve all got way too many meetings to track each one, but I tend to remember the ones that I’m in charge of. My take away from this conversation…Fuck. I probably was acting like I was in charge of the meeting even though I wasn’t. Again.

Confidence builds on itself. When little Billy is tasked with something and he successfully accomplishes that task, he will be more willing to do it again. He will get better; and when he gets better, he’ll get more chances to keep practicing. He gets reinforced with the “I might be good at this” messaging.

Meanwhile little not Billy who doesn’t do the thing also gets his ideas that he’s no good at the thing reinforced. It makes me think of that old expression, “It takes money to make money” in that if you have some confidence you’ll get some more confidence just by feeling more comfortable putting yourself out there.

Challenge yourself to try new things. It should suck when it’s new. There’s no growth without suck. Challenge others to stretch their wings too. This is not a dress rehearsal, so we gotta get all we can out of this run. Live with no ragrets, not even one letter. If there’s messaging in your head telling you that it’s not okay to admit that you can be good at something, squish that voice. It’s being a bitch. If you’re worried that you’ll have an unhealthy amount of unchecked confidence, take that off the table too. The universe has a great way of keeping your shit in check.

I was right. I could dye my hair in the time I had. It turned out well. Then the next day I thought, “Chemical peel, I bet I can do that” and my face melted off. As if the universe plainly stated, “Bitch. Be humble.” Got it. Thanks universe. Message received.