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So ... I did it! I went to gym for the first time in months ... well, that’s not true because I haven’t been to the gym in about 4 years. Long story short, I really am not much of gym fanatic at all, actually I’m not a fan, so a few weeks back I returned to the gym to renew my lifetime contract (yes, the one I let lapse those 4 years ago).
Wait ... it’s not as bad as it seems! It’s not that I haven’t been without exercise.
You see, I love walking!!
I also love nature!!
Put those two together and before I knew it I had been walking the kilos off in pure bliss for years and years. Don’t get me wrong, I’m far from a runner over all this time ... I started walking and progressively and very naturally moved along to a little walk-run-walk-stroll-walk-run kinda thing. But something changed near the end of last year – something even more natural and progressive!
I got bored with walking and with fighting the summer sun and having to make sure I walked really early to avoid sunstroke by 730am and in the end, I simply stopped.
Don’t believe the theory that a pattern is formed in a certain amount of time and is then a way of life ... I’ve seen people return to smoking after 5 years – what happened to the pattern then?
Goal versus purpose ... that’s what happened!
Don’t make me do anything that’s not fun! It’s the benchmark to anything I do in my life and exercising my body is no different.
Lugging a body that is well over 40kg’s to the gym is exhausting enough. However, to be met with the rules that are laid on about exercise is diabolically destructive to the ‘body’ who is most probably more frightened of the thought of exercise than you are of any one of your snake, spider, confined space phobias.
EVERYBODY should move their BODY ... it’s as natural as having sex or eating ... FULL STOP!!!
For so many of us, it’s not that natural a process and we need a little support along the way ... so we go the gym and sometimes we even go as far as having a personal trainer. We are so excited to just be there, even though our bodies have some catching up to do with our new found enthusiasm.
And then it begins ...
We are hit with science, theory and more often – speculation!
If you don’t do more than 20 minutes you are not burning fat!
You have to get your heart rate to this and you have to get your muscles to do that! Weight training... .. like yesterday already! Move faster ... do another rep! Feel it burn! Yes, it’s supposed to feel as though you are going to die ... you made yourself FAT ... this is what it takes to get THIN!
Wait ... isn’t fat to thin a goal! With the long term success rate of weight loss being as low as 2% - 20% ... do you think that goal is working??
Wow, I’ve just had a moment where I thought I was generalising and then I remembered that I don’t think I’ve met anyone in my lifetime who’s not concerned about their body mass in some way or another ... so back to my point!
Everyone else in the world seemed to be watching “the biggest loser” with such awe, yet I thought there was nothing more unrealistic and degrading under the sun. Maybe I watched it as a ‘fat person’ and empathised with the excessive training regime that must have been a total shock to the body. We don’t shove people into Formula one cars because of the G force it pulls and not just anyone can go up to space ... yet when it comes to exercise we are told to push, push, push!
Google it ... see how many of the ‘biggest losers’ are a success story today!
I did it ... found myself a personal trainer and embarked on losing weight after a friend of mine told me that he couldn’t put the photographs of our December holiday on display because I looked like a hippopotamus! Tactless ... yes! But then again he was a very, very dear friend (at the time) ... and gay (so from where he was standing I really would look hideous on the mantelpiece!) ... so I will always love him for that!
I lugged my heavy body off to the gym and was hit with rules and statistics to weight loss that equated my body to being thrust into a car driven by Michael Schumacher overdosed on red bull.
I was forced to walk on a treadmill at a pace that was beyond my leg, arm, brain coordination – for 30 minutes! Oh, did I mention that was the first day? I don’t have to put you through the next 30 minutes ... it’s too painful to remember anyway!
I’m sure some of you are saying ... that doesn’t sound so bad ... well read on and maybe all you need to get from this blog entry is a little bit of empathy for those bodies that you criticise for not being able to do the scientifically specified amount of exercise to lose weight.
I’m not arguing science ... I am, however, telling you that from the day I was marked the ‘hippo’ and ran from the gym screaming in fear, I have steadily and very simply walked off well of 30kgs. In the four years, I have also been in the success bracket of those who have kept their weight off ... and so I think I have the right to give the exercise fearing individuals some great advice.
Don’t listen to what anybody says about how much the body needs in order to feel exercised. Throw the goals away and look at your body in its rawest form. It’s meant to move ... for very good reason! If anything does not move it becomes stagnant and eventually dies. Look at the waterfall that crashes over the mountain edge and tell me that is does not sparkle with activity.
Stuff the goals if you are exercising because you feel like shit and hate your body (that’s for another blog ... because I have had many years of that) ... find the core purpose for wanting to get up and move!
I’ll go first ... I couldn’t breathe too well in the end. Walking from the shops to my car was a mission ... that’s not a goal, that’s a purpose ... the purpose of life and staying alive. That one worked for me, go ahead and find your own ... not a goal, but a deep and positive purpose for wanting to achieve that goal. Not a negative statement ... but a POSITIVE purpose!
Now move ...
Even if you only walk a little faster in the shops (My sister and I did that today and contemplated skipping gym ... but we both know we’re a little beyond speed walking through a mall). A few years ago it was impossible.
I began to understand that it has absolutely nothing to do with science and everything to do with the intention and attention you pay to your body while doing any kind of movement. I just walked and I didn’t even do it consistently ... months went by without doing any form of exercise, but when I started to walk again, I took my whole body with me ... including my mind.
I took it with me because I certainly wasn’t leaving it behind to be seduced by the rules and the science and because I knew that if I just gave myself one moment to feel what it was like to move ... even if it was only for ten minutes and walking through a mall, that one day I would want more and more and more.
A few months ago, I wanted more! Walking was no longer enough and through the natural progression and never losing sight of my purpose (yet having no goals for my gym regime at all) and I signed up for the gym.
I went to the gym for 40 minutes today ... and achieved more for my body than someone who ran a triathlon!
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