Recently in Discipline Category
Blame It on My Brain
I stumbled upon an interesting theory in the NYT recently that suggests the brain has more influence over our athletic performance than we give it credit for. A research team from the Northumbrian University in England had a group of cyclists pedal as fast as they possibly could in a series of time trials designed to determine the limits of their speed. Then they had them race an on-screen virtual cyclist, who researchers said were riding at the participants' top speed. In fact, the avatars were actually riding slightly faster than that. Still, in every case, the participants matched or beat their virtual competitors, setting personal best times across the board.
One obvious explanation is that competition pushes us to perform better, but researchers wondered how the body was actually able to extract that extra bit of energy when we believe we've gone as fast as we can go. Their conclusion: Our brains tend to conserve fuel. They don't want us to work too hard--unless we absolutely have to.
So I dedicate this past week of my fitness challenge to my compassionate brain.
Day 12: Monday, 9/19
There are Mondays and there are Mondays. I awoke early this morning and got my entire zazen and workout routine in before breakfast. Did three rounds of my kettlebell circuit, which ramped up my heart rate in a good way. You know, it might just be me, but I never really feel like swinging a kettlebell around in the morning. In fact, several times during my meditation session, I consider rising and moving on without all that exertion. Sometimes my rational mind wins and I just walk away, but more often than not (though I'm not really keeping track), once I lean into those pushups, I get on a roll and happily push through the routine. And I always head off to work feeling pretty great. Blame it on the endorphins.
Day 13: Tuesday, 9/20
So much of what passes for motivation--or lack thereof--depends on how we feel in the mornings. And today I awoke with a gnarly throat and a head full of something that felt like congealed gravy, so I stayed home from work and called it a recovery day. By evening I was feeling good enough to help MLW plant our first tree in the backyard, so you can't say I was a slug all day. A good night's sleep, I think, is all that stands between me and a fabulous Wednesday.
Day 14, Wednesday, 9/21
I slept so well last night that I didn't wake up until it was too late for my normal morning routine. So I grabbed my giri and did 15 quick girevoy moves to get my blood flowing, wolfed down an egg and some toast and hit the road. An evening meeting kept my butt in a chair for an extra couple of hours after work. Not a great day, fitness-wise.
Day 15, Thursday, 9/22
Yoga day!! MLW and I arrived early to class--until I discovered that I had left my keys in the back door and decided it would be too much of a distraction to just leave them there (I can't practice yoga and practice non-attachment to my household goods at the same time), so I went back home to retrieve them, which made me 10 minutes late to class. Thankfully, JS is less formal than your average yogi and simply waited for me to show up before getting things started. She also added a few moves this week, the most interesting of which were the boat pose and a kind of upward plank that I found I could actually almost do. Also worth noting: I touched my toes (though I confess that my knees were slightly bent). All in all, a very vigorous session, which I suspect I'll be paying for tomorrow.
Day 16, Friday, 9/23
Sure enough, I was plenty sore today. Let's call it a recovery day.
Day 17, Saturday, 9/24
Pulled out all the stops on my morning workout today--even adding a couple of new moves after three full circuits with the kettlebell. Wasn't wearing a heart-rate monitor, but I would guess my HR was up in the 140s. Worked up a good sweat before breakfast and then climbed on my bicycle for the 3-mile ride to the farmer's market. Tacked on a couple more miles later in the day. Felt good.
Day 18, Sunday, 9/25
I really debated whether to run this morning, but lost the argument. I'm really having trouble motivating myself to get out there and jog. Partly, I think, it's a question of practicality. I seldom have time to run before work in the morning--assuming that it would require about a half-hour of getting dressed, running, getting undressed, showering. Can't really use that excuse on the weekend, so how about this one: I have to admit, it just feels kind of dorky to be out there on the sidewalk huffing my way around the block in front of my neighbors. Maybe I have self-esteem issues....
Ya Say Ya Want a Resolution . . .
I've been avoiding the gym these past couple of weeks so that I could make a resolution to get back to the gym in 2011. And guess what? After resolving to get back to the gym, I squeezed in a nice workout this afternoon.
So, it's not even New Year's Day yet and I've already met my goal for 2011!
Actually, I'm not big on the whole New Year's resolutions thing. I'm a Minnesotan, after all, and we like to think that if you do the best you can, you're doing OK. That doesn't mean you shouldn't have some goals in life, it just means you shouldn't obsess about them. Just plug away; that's how we roll.
Plenty of experts, in fact, will tell you that the best way to sustain a fitness regimen is to incorporate it into your everyday life: take the bus instead of driving, walk the dog every morning, schedule your workouts just as you would any business meeting or social obligation, pack a healthy lunch for work, yadda, yadda. Just plug away. Don't make a big deal out of it.
Last January, I ran into an old friend of mine and her partner down at the gym. They were huffing and puffing on the treadmill and proudly announced to me that they were determined this year to get into shape at all costs. I wished them well, and cautioned them about doing too much too soon. A couple days later I ran into them again. They were working out every day, my friend told me -- cardio, strength training, stretching, the whole nine yards. That was great, I replied. But you might want to take a day off from time to time, I suggested. Recovery time is important, too.
A few weeks later, they were still at it. Grinding it out each day like a couple of boot campers. But their resolve was weakening. The weight wasn't melting off the way they had imagined it would. And the treadmill was getting pretty tedious, she confessed. Might be time to take a few days off, I said. But the idea didn't seem to register.
I haven't seen them at the gym at all for several months now, which doesn't necessarily mean they've thrown in the towel. (They could say they haven't seen me at the gym much lately, either.) But, I suspect they took my advice and took a few days off -- days that stretched into months. It's easy to do, believe me.
That's why we have a new year every 12 months: so folks can resolve to get back into shape, to eat better, to be nicer to their friends, to finish reading that sprawling novel by the young Czech writer whose name you can't pronounce but whose prose was so riveting when you cracked the book open at the cabin last summer but whose magnum opus has now been sitting on the coffee table beneath a stack of yellowing National Geographics since August. We live for these challenges, right?
And if a New Year's resolution helps motivate you to achieve these kinds of goals, then I say go for it. Whatever works is my motto. And, for me, that means continuing to plug away. It felt good to get to the gym today. I might even go again tomorrow.
Questions and Intentions
I've been having
a little trouble getting to the gym lately, so a recent article in Science Daily that delved into the
mysteries of motivation caught my attention. The piece describes some
interesting new research at the University of Illinois that suggests we should
be asking ourselves whether we're
going to get something done rather than telling
ourselves to do it.
"The popular
idea is that self-affirmations enhance people's ability to meet their goals," said
Professor Dolores Albarracin. "It seems, however, that when it comes to
performing a specific behavior, asking questions is a more promising way of achieving
your objectives."
In other words,
when I got ready for work this morning I'd be more likely to squeeze in a
workout after work if I questioned my ability to do so. At least that's what
the research indicates. You can read all about it here. That's not how I tend
to operate, though - at least not consciously. Take this morning, for instance.
I had a good night's sleep and woke up feeling like I could conquer the world,
so I'm thinking, Hey, why not squeeze in
a workout tonight? - which is different from thinking, Geeze, am I ever going to get to the gym again? and also not quite
the same as, By golly, I'm really going
to go to the gym tonight!
While the U of I
researchers found that questioning one's ability to achieve a goal rather than stating their intentions was more
likely to spur their study subjects to positive action, my approach this morning when I stuffed my gear into my backpack
sort of falls into a gray area between declaration and doubt. It's more like a
vague intention than anything else. And maybe that means I could get waylaid
between my office and the locker room by the slightest distraction, like an
invitation from My Lovely Wife to meet her at our local bistro right after work.
Which raises an
interesting point: When was the last time I went to the gym without letting MLW
know what was up? And was that in the form of a question or an assertion? This
morning, it was simply an announcement: Hey,
I'm going to hit the gym after work. Does that make it less likely that
I'll actually follow through? Should I call her and ask permission as a way to fuel
my motivation? Should I suddenly begin pretending
to doubt my own intentions so I'll be able to fight off any inertia (that
doesn't seem to be weighing on me at this moment) and go work out like I have
every intention of doing anyway?
That ought to be
enough questions to get me through several workouts.
Easy Does It
My Lovely Wife and I got
married on Facebook this evening. She, sitting comfortably in her favorite
chair across the living room from me in my favorite chair, noticed in a bit of
a panic that she'd not identified her husband on her Facebook page and quickly
remedied the situation with a few keystrokes before giving me that look and
suggesting in her most persuasive voice that I might want to reply to the
request that I confirm our relationship. So now we are coupled in cyberspace.
That was easy.
I recount this magical
moment not so much because I want you all to be part of our digital nuptials
(our actual wedding almost 29 years ago required only a bit more planning than
this evening's celebration), but because it synchs so nicely with my current
fitness vibe: Do what seems necessary at the moment.
For the past month or so,
I've been hitting the gym maybe once a week at the most, neglecting the tennis
court altogether, squeezing in a few pushup-and-planks workouts before work,
and generally opting for a take-care-of-myself approach to living as opposed to
my normal über-disciplined aspirational semi-obsession to fitness. This past
weekend, for instance, I felt a real need to de-stress, so I slept late, read
books and generally practiced eliciting my body's parasympathetic
response (AKA breathing) while steering clear of any activity that didn't
veer toward leisure. It's a good thing to do once in awhile.
I've been thinking recently
that I'm harboring more stress in my body than I care to admit to myself -- or
anyone else -- and that I need to make a conscious effort to unravel those
knots. And, yes, exercise has been shown to be a
great antidote to stress, but sometimes -- when your son takes away the car
for a weekend and that weekend's temperature barely inches above zero and the
pantry's well stocked and gosh isn't it quiet and isn't the sun shining in on
that chair at just the right angle to attract a purring cat to your lap and,
yes, a cup of tea would be just lovely, thank you -- it's more productive to
just take it easy.
This "what, me
worry" attitude has been embraced by one of the nation's most prominent
doctors, Susan M. Love, whose new book, Live a Little! Breaking the Rules Won't
Break Your Health, celebrates a more laissez faire approach to fitness.
In this interview in Tara Parker-Pope's (is she married on Facebook?) New York Times health
blog, Love explains that we're a lot healthier than we tend to think we are
and that we ought to just chill a little on the whole weight-loss,
carbo-loading, six-pack-abs-and-buns-of-steel thing.
"Everything is a
U-shaped curve," Love tells Parker-Pope. "There may be times in your
life when you've gotten too much of this or too little of that, but being in
the middle is better, and most of us are probably there already."
I'm good with that. But I'm
still going to play tennis tomorrow night -- just because it's fun. And
tomorrow morning I'll bundle up and walk that 2.5 miles to work -- just because
it's, well, not fun, but eventually
pleasant. And maybe Wednesday night I'll go and sit for an hour or so at the
zendo -- just for the chance to breathe and unravel and see what happens. Ice
skating on Saturday? Perhaps.
But Sunday I'll be drinking
beer (not too much) and watching football -- because that's fun too. That is,
if my new wife will let me.
Attention Deficit
I strive on a fairly regular
basis to reduce my natural obliviousness to things (it's a guy thing), but I do
not always succeed. Take Tuesday's workout, for instance. I'd been avoiding the
gym during the latter phases of its renovation - it was actually closed for a
few days last week - so when I showed up after work, it took awhile for me to
get my bearings. Someone had moved the scale in the locker room, for one thing.
And the stretching area that once shared space with the cardio machines had
expanded into its own room (not that I'd ever spend any time there). I couldn't
even locate the towels at first glance.
Eventually, I got myself
situated on the only Elliptical Death Machine that was available and swung into
my normal routine: pumping away while enjoying the mute ravings of that
investment guy with his sleeves rolled way up on CNN. It had been another
mysterious day for the Dow, apparently, and he was gesticulating a bit more
wildly than usual.
I looked down at the time on
the EDM's control panel - after about five minutes I like to shift it into
second gear, upping the resistance from 10 to 15. My heart rate was rising in a
way that nicely countered Wall Street's decline that day. So I cranked away.
I'd been doing some morning body-weight and kettlebell exercises during my days
away from the gym, but no serious cardio, so it felt good to be back on the EDM
again.
About 15 minutes into my
workout, though, I began to notice an intermittent high-pitched beeping noise. At
first, it appeared to be coming from the ceiling nearby, and I wondered whether
a smoke alarm somewhere had been set off by mistake. It certainly was annoying,
but I figured someone at the club would eventually locate the origin of the
sound and flip some switch. Meanwhile, the TV investment guy was working up
quite a lather over some particularly under-priced stock, waving his arms around
more excitedly than usual, desperately trying to get our attention.
I ratcheted up the
resistance to 20 and shifted my focus a little toward the effort required to
push through each stride on the EDM. The rhythm of my stride, I began to
notice, roughly coincided with that annoying beeping sound - which, I also
began to notice, was really more like a high-pitched squeak than a beep. When I
slowed my stride, the frequency of the annoying squeaking sound also seemed to
slow. When I sped up, it sped up.
I don't tend to look at my
fellow sweat-a-holics when I'm doing cardio. I figure it's no business of mine
what they're wearing or reading or what annoying sound their machine happens to
be broadcasting throughout the entire club while they're striding, oblivious,
toward endorphin-land. So, I didn't really notice whether there was any discernible
sense of relief that flowed through the crowd when I climbed down from the EDM a
bit earlier than I had planned, toweled off and walked sheepishly toward the
water fountain in the suddenly quieter room.
No Excuses
My father died 30 years ago
today, so some of my siblings and I (along with my daughter) will be marking
the occasion later this afternoon at a tiny cemetery in Becker, Minn., where he
and my mother are buried - along with a large contingent of the Cox clan
(including my grandfather and great-grandfather).
There will be much reminiscing about our childhood years, I'm sure, and I
expect we'll raise a few glasses of Grain Belt in his honor.
He made his living
delivering that golden elixir to bars and restaurants in St. Paul, an occupation
that earned him a barrel chest and arms like steel. (I remember returning from
Air Force basic training feeling pretty buff and foolishly challenging him to
an arm-wrestling match at the dining room table. It was over before I could
contemplate the true depths of my delusion.) He was strong, but somehow sickly
at the same time.
That barrel chest loomed
over an even larger belly (he fought weight issues for much of his adult life),
and he suffered from ulcers and other digestive ailments. His love of fried
foods and sweets was legendary around our house, and we all learned how to
smoke cigarettes and drink beer by observing him.
Of course, back in the '40s
and '50s none of us knew the dangers of smoking - much less the insidious
threats posed by greasy foods, refined carbs, a sedentary lifestyle and chronic
stress (Dad was a hall-of-fame worrier). So, when he landed in the hospital
with a heart attack at the age of 52, we were all shocked. And when cancer
claimed him eight years later, we all felt he'd been stolen from us.
So I was thinking about Dad
this morning while doing my morning zazen.
And later while sweating through a half hour of push-ups, planks and kettlebell
moves. He really didn't know any better. I don't have that excuse.
A New Training Incentive
Before Monday's workout, I'd been away from the gym for a couple of weeks (vacation + procrastination), and I'm feeling the effects today: sore shoulders and arms from lifting, mostly. So, of course, I'm wondering whether there's a less painful way for geezers like myself to come back to their workout regimen after a period of relative inactivity.
(That's not to say I did nothing during those two weeks. During the first week, I played three rounds of mini-golf with my son, trekked three times to the lodge -- a 2-mile round trip -- to fetch donuts (yum!) and a newspaper, and spent an hour or so one afternoon paddling around on a flotation device of dubious reliability. Back home, I bicycled to the food co-op -- about a 16-mile round trip -- a couple of times, played two sets of tennis, and briefly considered cutting the grass.)
But nothing gets you lathered up quite like an hour or so of cardio and lifting (oh yeah, and stretching) at the gym. Trouble is, after a bit of a layoff it can be a little tough on your body. If I'm not feeling sore (like I am today), I tend to dive right back in, even after a long layoff, and crank out my usual 75-minute cardio/lifting routine. And that might not be the best approach, actually. The folks at Harvard Medical School suggest that you cut your workout time in half for a few days as you readjust. Of course, they also added this intriguing bit of trivia:
"The value of maintaining an exercise program became evident when the results of the Harvard Alumni Health Study were published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The men who had been moderately active but later became sedentary had a 15% higher risk of death than their counterparts who had never been active."Which makes me want to double my workout time. After all, what's a little muscle soreness in the broader scheme of things?
Calories and Cardio
So, as promised in my earlier post, I'm reporting back. And as I suspected, I haven't been able to get to the gym every day on a regular schedule since then, but I have been getting in some good workouts when I've been down there. Most notably, I've taken my young PT's advice about lengthening my stints on the Elliptical Death Machine. I've done 45 minutes on a couple of occasions, which burns about 600 calories and leaves me pretty much drenched in sweat (but in a good way). I've been mixing my resistance training between the machines and The Pit (heavier on the machines).
To review: Rather than the M-W-F lifting, T-Th cardio, and Sunday basketball ritual, I've been content to mix cardio and lifting on alternate days and imagine myself shooting hoops (with great style and accuracy -- and really cool sneakers) on Sunday. I've never actually attempted a serious workout two days in a row. Maybe someday. When I'm younger.
Oh, and I've cured my obsession with FitDay. I simply stopped filling out the info one day. I figure after about three months of tracking my eating, I'm pretty clear on what I need to do to stay on track. It was an interesting experiment, actually. I learned that I don't consume that many calories (about 2,000/day on average) and that I don't have a great deal of trouble getting my RDA of most nutrients. I'm a little low on vitamin E and calcium, and it seems like I can eat a half-dozen servings of fruits, veggies and nuts, plus a 4-by-8 sheet of plywood and still not reach my RDA for fiber, but for the most part, it appears I'm eating a pretty healthy diet. I've been avoiding refined sugar and carbs as much as possible and a more mindful approach to stuffing my face is paying off, I think. I've dropped five pounds since I started keeping track of this stuff. My goal is to drop five more (down to 155) by the end of the summer. If I succeed, please be assured that I will not appear at a local beach in a speedo.
Anyway, it appears that I'm motivated again. I'll do 45 minutes on the EDM tonight and some upper-body work on the machines. Maybe I'll even try to stretch out this right calf of mine, which has been cramping up of late. Or not.
Coasting
Got milk?
You know, you look up from the mess on the desk in front of you and you notice that a month has gone by and you haven't sprained an ankle, torn an Achilles tendon or blown out your knee and that's a good thing, generally, though you also notice there are cobwebs collecting now on your blog site and the seven readers you once had are now busying themselves filling out March Madness brackets and catching ESPN updates every three minutes on their I-Pod-Phone-Touch thing. So, it appears some catching up is in order....
The ice is out on the Mississippi and the roads and park trails are clear, which is always the signal for me to roll my old Schwinn out of the garage and change the nature of my commute. Sunday, I actually cleaned out the garage and chipped the ice from the floor (don't ask), which turned out to be a great little functional fitness workout -- bending, twisting, lifting, squatting, digging, cursing, lamenting poor foundational structure, etc. Then I climbed on my bike and rode west, past Lake Nokomis along Minnehaha Creek and through several smaller bodies of water that were too large to describe as puddles. I managed to stay upright and remain more or less dry all the way to Park Avenue and back -- a distance of about 5 or 6 miles.
This managed to work my hamstrings and quads in a way they haven't been worked for a while -- I've been avoiding the bicycle-that-goes-nowhere machine at the gym for many months, because it tends to leave my left knee barking. But, I'm happy to report that my Sunday ride and my subsequent jaunts over the bridge to and from the office this week have been kind to all of my functioning body parts, as far as I can tell.
Of course, I don't push myself very hard on my commute (last summer, in fact, a jogger passed me going up the hill from 46th Street to the Intercity Bridge) or when I bicycle for recreation. I'm just not one of those guys who pulls on the skin-tight bike shorts and colorful shirts with the pocket in the back and races automobiles on the parkway. I like to coast.
I feel like I've been coasting at the gym in recent weeks, as well. Same old comfortable routine: 25 minutes on the EDM, a little stretching (maybe) and a half hour on the resistance machinery. I've been avoiding the free weights since my last (and first) visit there back in February, but I may get back there for a bit tonight and see what happens. I got a little inspired last week, when I had occasion to drop in on Marty Gallagher's Web site. He's a former championship powerlifter and now trainer who argues passionately in favor of free weights (and lots of them) over the resistance machines. His new book, The Purposeful Primitive, draws on the wisdom of legendary lifters like Paul Anderson (above) and Ed Coan to design a serious cardio and strength-training regimen.
It's fun to read about guys like Anderson, who had a two-hole golf course set up on his Tennessee farm and liked to squat-lift an 800-pound barbell a few times after putting out, then tee off, chip onto the green, putt out and press 400 pounds a few times at the other green. "Paul combined short, intense workouts ... throughout the day, with periods of rest. For example, he would do 10 reps in the squat with 600, rest for about 30 minutes, and then do a second set of 10. After another 30 minutes rest, he would increase the weight to 825 and do three reps, rest again and do two more reps with 845. then he would rest again and conclude by doing half squats with 1200 for two or three reps and quarter squats with 1800. the whole routine took three hours or more. He would sip milk during the rest periods, consuming a gallon or more throughout the course of the day."
I would do that, of course, but I'm not a big milk drinker.
Ya Say You Want a Resolution?
Everyone seems to expect resolutions at this time of year, which to me is an interesting phenomenon. It's the dead of winter, a time of reflection, certainly, but not action -- and you need both to make a resolution work, right? Still, the gym is packed with folks fuelled by resolutionary fervor, doing their utmost to fulfil some promise they made to themselves on New Year's Eve.
Or, at least I assume the gym is packed. I haven't been downstairs for a couple of weeks. Laid low by my annual holiday cold virus, I've been gulping echinacea and vitamin C capsules, blowing my nose and coughing until I feel like my head's going to explode. Evenings have found me wrapped in a blanket on my favorite living room chair, staring vacantly into space. (Night before last, I remarked to My Lovely Wife how I must look just about ready for the Home. She didn't disagree.) Not exactly a resolution-inspiring atmosphere.
I'm definitely on the mend, though. I slept through the night for the first time in recent memory last night, and enjoyed a pleasant walk to work this morning, despite temps in the single digits and a nasty NE wind. I almost lugged my workout gear with me. But not quite.
Still, I'm about ready to dive back in: Climb back on that Elliptical Death Machine. Start cranking away on bench presses. Maybe even get a little more disciplined about my morning routine.
Full disclosure: I've been struggling in recent months to rise early enough each morning to do a little routine I've enjoyed, sporadically, in the past few months: some pretend yoga, a little zazen, followed by planks (thank you, JS) and pushups. Maybe 45 minutes total. When I'm able to squeeze this routine in, it really gets the blood circulating. Makes the whole morning a bit more vivid. I just haven't been able to do it very frequently. I'd like to make that happen more regularly.
But I'm not resolving to get up earlier, because if I resolve to get up earlier, I might push myself to rise before I've had enough sleep, which would be counter-productive. And I'm not resolving to go to bed earlier, either, so I can get enough sleep, because sometimes when I'm lounging at night in my favorite chair, covered by a blanket, cradling a cat or two on my lap, and feeling every bit as old as I probably look, My Lovely Wife might be sitting there across the room in her favorite chair, her own lap blanketed and occupied by a cat, and a conversation could ensue and before you know it, it's midnight, and we're still going on about Darwin's orchids or Delacroix's obsession with the light in Morocco or a local postman's preference for wearing shorts in November (MLW is like this). And who would want to miss out on something like that?
That's the trouble with traditional resolution-making: It can become kind of an all-or-nothing deal that doesn't account for the serendipitous occasions that are rewarding in their own right, even as they derail your stated intentions. Or it can become so all-encompassing that you ignore your body when it's pleading with you to slow down.
The key, as Elizabeth Larsen points out in this EL piece from last summer, is to celebrate small victories on your way to bigger goals. "As with so many life goals,
becoming fit isn't just about some mythical 'end result,'" she writes. "In fact, the
unexpected benefits of fitness -- improved energy levels, better
concentration and a closer relationship with your body, to name just a few --
can prove much more satisfying."
I've managed to avoid resolving anything during this two-year personal fitness adventure, and I feel like I've accomplished more than enough to keep me moving in the right direction. My walking commute has been nothing but a joy; for all its randomness, my resistance training has significantly increased my upper-body strength; and my cardio efforts haven't done me any harm (at least once I stopped running on the treadmill). Yeah, I could do more stretching, and some days I do (so bug off, OK?). But I'll never make it part of a resolution. I'll just try to keep it in mind, continue doing what I've been doing and see what happens.
Hey, maybe that's my resolution: Stay mindful. Keep moving. See what happens. I can live with that.
Desperately Dodging Discipline?
I've been trapped in the gulag of budgeting and other brutal corporate pursuits for the past few weeks, so -- well, you know the drill . . . .
This morning, however, I arose at a reasonable hour, let out the dog, ignored the disaster in the kitchen, spread out my mat and sat zazen for maybe 15 minutes (all the while doing my best to breathe through the sounds of the cat climbing into and out of the wreckage of last night's spaghetti dinner). The bicycle ride into work was a bit bracing (mark Oct. 9 as the first day I've needed gloves) and I marveled at the trees along the riverbank, which are well into their annual autumnal fireworks. All that was missing was the bold woodchuck that has lately been foraging in the woods near the bridge. Still, pretty much a perfect morning.
I've been thinking a lot lately about becoming more disciplined about my morning routine, because when I do manage to leave myself enough time in the pre-commuting hours to run through my preferred wake-up regimen -- a little stretching, 30 Dr. Oz pushups, a few yoga poses and a 30-minute sit -- before a quiet breakfast and a cup of tea, I always feel great the rest of the day. To make that happen, though, requires a good 90-minute window of time before I pack up my bag and climb on my Schwinn. And that means I need to crawl out of bed sometimes when I'm not fully rested -- which, of course, is not a good thing for an older person like myself. If I don't get enough sleep, my immune system rebels and I'm susceptible to the common cold, etc.
So, the key is to get to bed nice and early in a household full of night owls. Hmm. . . . Like I said, it takes some discipline.
A brief note on last night's sweat-a-thon: Because it had been nine days since my last real workout, I decided to take it easy. I did about 20 minutes on this new Elliptical Death Machine -- which I prefer to the older Elliptical Death Machines, because its orange-and-black exterior reminds me of Halloween (or the Chicago Bears uniforms) and I seem to be able to operate it with much less risk of bodily injury. It also really gets my heart rate going (it must be love). I skipped the stretching stuff because I guess I didn't want to stretch. Then, I spent about 30 minutes working my abs and upper body on the resistance machinery -- also refraining from pushing myself too hard.
It must've worked. I feel pretty great today. And it's not just because the budget's done.
Recent Comments