Exercise Rant

I’m the first person to admit that I’m a lazy ass exerciser. If it hurts, I don’t do it, I say. The thought of Stairmasters or gym weights fills me with dread, and if you ever see me running down the road, call 911, because there must be a masked man with a chainsaw not far behind me. However, every week I come home from my current belly dance class covered in sweat and smiling. My yoga sessions end with my limbs purring and my mind peaceful. Both practices hurt like hell sometimes, breaking my main rule for exercise, so what gives? Am I merely reacting to the endorphins flooding my system post-workout? What keeps me coming back? What keeps anyone coming back to exercise?

We Americans have a serious love hate relationship with physical fitness. Our current female ideal is still a twig-like slenderness with precious little curve (yet we love big boobs. Figure that one out.) And despite feminist protest, our physical male ideal is also trim, fit, and/or muscular. I have yet to see a Harlequin Romance book cover featuring a chubby guy with just the best personality. Just saying. Anyway, this ideal pushes many of us toward the gym in an effort to sculpt our bodies into such desired and, let’s face it, often unrealistic shapes. Yet we Americans as a society are…well…not lazy so much as…idle. I’m not saying we’re the second half of Wall-e, but thanks to technology and our success as a nation, we spend a great deal of our day on our asses.

Let’s take me, for example. Cutting all bullshit and excuses, at least 75% of the time, when I get off work, I want to do nothing more than sit on my ass with my hands glued to my laptop and the TV on in the background. Now as for the excuses, I’m often writing and researching (with Facebook ever present in the corner tab), and other times I’m reading on my Nook, etc, but I’m not moving from my butt indentation on the couch.  I definitely have a lazy ass couch potato streak in me. Given my own insatiable need to browse Pinterest paired with my attitude toward most exercise, I understand why it’s so hard for many of us to get off our black hole of a couch, slap on some spandex, and get sweating. I know for me the cycle of wanting to exercise, talking myself out of it, sitting on my ass for hours, then feeling guilty and pathetic makes me want to leap off a cliff.*

I know I’m not the best spokesperson for exercise or weight loss (see the asterisk at the end of this post), but I still want to share what drags me from my idle happy place and into shimmying, back-bending action.

Casual Thought Process: I do not always respond well to pressure. Actually, this post is kind of late because I realized that there are non-imaginary friends of mine out there who do follow this ridiculous blog of mine, and way more of them than I thought. This led to me being self-conscious, juggling a bunch of ideas around, rewriting, and panicking until I finally just thought ‘Dammit, Dee, just do what you always do and spew word vomit into the internet vortex without a care.’

I maintain the same approach with exercise. If I make it a big deal in my mind, if I think If you don’t do this, you’re going to lose your endurance and get fat and never dance again and lose your flexibility and ARGH!, then I fly into panic mode and avoid the anxiety-inducing task. However, if I approach it with the thought of, Fuck it, it’s only an hour of my life, and then I can sit on my ass guilt-free for the rest of the day, then I find it much easier to get up and do it. Given the amount of hours we as a generation spend on the internet (tally it up one day, it’ll depress the hell out of you), one hour of exercise sounds like no big deal.

Dual Purpose Exercise: This one may only work for me. I mentioned before how the idea of jogging, weights, or anything with the word ‘fitness’ in it is an immediate turn off for me. I feel like I’m busting my ass for no reason other than a better body. For most, that’s motivation enough. But for me, I don’t know, it’s never worked. Belly dance is perfect for me because I’m busting my ass learning a skill, an art form that allows me to wear costumes and perform onstage and show what I’ve been busting my ass learning. I’ve always been a bit of a showoff, I guess, and I firmly believe that at the core of every actor/dancer/performer is a little kid screaming “LOOK WHAT I CAN DO!” Belly dance appeases that little kid in me, and as a bonus I get wicked abs. As for yoga, I’m not sure I would have ever stuck with something so fitness-y (stand, bend in an odd way, breathe, bend in another odd way, stand) if it weren’t the one thing that shuts up my overactive brain. It also keeps my GAD in check. So for yoga, the benefits are largely in the psychological department, and as a bonus I’m all bendy and flexible. You’re welcome, Boyfriend.

Gotta love costumes!

Youtube/Pinterest: Using the problem to help with the solution! During my excessive down time, I will make the conscious effort to browse Pinterest for healthy food recipes and Youtube for belly dance videos because it fuels my desire for such activities. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gotten up and tried to replicate what I just saw Unmata or Rachel Brice do in a video, and I’ve already discussed the wonders of Pinterest and food inspiration. But careful, this is a slippery slope. Many people have fallen into the trap of spending hours posting motivational fitness crap on their Pinterest boards for the “future” and never get around to actually getting up and doing it. So only do this in moderation. Also, find a way to shut off the little side video tab on Youtube, because that could also lead you down one hell of a rabbit hole of timesuck, as I’m sure you know.

Just Fucking Do It: Whomever pitched that slogan to Nike hit the nail on the head (although I have to add ‘fucking’ in it for extra motivation). For me, the physical act of getting to your exercise destination, whether that be driving to class or slipping into a sports bra and putting in a dvd, has always been the great hurdle. And because I can talk myself into thinking that life itself is pointless, this hurdle has won over my desire to exercise more times than I’m proud of. Unfortunately, the only way I’ve been able to overcome this is to ignore my brain, throw on my coat, and force myself out the door. I will be mentally bitching the entire way there, but once I get through those doors and into class, I am fine. This is a hard one, but shut off your brain, ignore excuses, and just go through the motions, even when your heart’s not in it. It’s like writing; if you wait for your muse, you’ll never do it. If you wait til you’re in the mood to exercise, you will never do it with any consistency and never see any benefits. Go with Nike. Just do it.

Just...fly?

Have a Masochistic Streak: My invisible/imaginary blog readers are well aware of my little masochistic streak thanks to many a post with far too much information about me. I’m not saying you have to be in the whips and crops and “Thank you, Sir, may I have another” department, but if you understand the grammatically unfortunate phrase “it hurts so good”, then you’re in the ball game. Getting a little enjoyment of how hard you’re working your body really helps you get through it. Otherwise exercise is just the physical torture we all fear it’s going to be.

            I’m currently in a fusion class with Setara, one of the best and most enthusiastic teachers I’ve had. If you’re in the Cbus area, seriously, check her out. She’s so much fun to watch and one of the most genuinely sweet people you’ll ever meet, and her love of dance and people and life in general is infectious. Anyway, recently, Setara has replaced our warm-ups with a belly dance boot camp routine, involving push-ups, lunges, squats, and crunches, all with a dance twist, of course. There are full classes like this out there, Belly Dance Fitness/Aerobics/Boot Camp, and I normally avoid the classes as if everyone attending them were infected with the T-virus. But Setara sprung it on us one week, and I couldn’t run, so I went with it, and I quickly discovered that I love it. Oh, it hurts. My legs are shaking and my abs are screaming and the sweat is pouring, all stuff I normally despise, but paired with belly dance, oh, it hurts so good. And I really do think that it has something to do with my masochism, just a bit. I mean, it’s not a sexual good feeling, but it’s a feeling of transcendence and accomplishment through pain. We did these leg lift crunches that were pure agony, and all I could think was, Oh, fucking ow, this is awesome.

            Anyway, before I start losing you, I think bearing in mind that if something hurts a lot at first (in a fitness way, not in an ‘I pulled something’ way), endorphins are on their way, and soon it’ll hurt so good, so don’t avoid the rough stuff.

            Our prevailing attitude that exercise sucks can be a dangerous one, physically and psychologically. But the simple fact is that we need physical exertion to be at our best. All the snarky anti-exercising memes in the world don’t make me feel any better about sitting on my ass for six hours in front of Facebook. But for me, the bottom line is that I love to dance, and I love yoga, and I will always come back to them when I’ve slipped into Couch Potato Dee mode. Maybe the key is to find a type of exercise you love. Or maybe the key is to ignore your own mental protests, get up, and go for a jog. Either way, the next time you find yourself being sucked into your favourite armchair or desk in front of your computer, make a deal with yourself. Do a half an hour of stretching and some jumping jacks before you let yourself sit down, or a gentle yoga session, or whatever. Just don’t sit down until you’ve done something to stave off guilt. Eventually you might find yourself enjoying the way stretching makes you feel. And if you work your way up to something that gets your heart pounding, hell, you might end up liking it, snarky anti-exercise memes be damned. That’s how it worked for me, and that’s how it works for a lot of people, so I would recommend trying it.

            Now if I could just cut back on the cookies.

*By now some of my invisible/imaginary blog readers might be thinking, “Dee, you’re a skinny bitch belly dancer. You might not feel like working out sometimes, but you obviously don’t have the issues that someone struggling with obesity or food addiction does. So shut the fuck up.”

I hear you. My proclamation of laziness does not match my physicality at first glance, and I’ve gotten enough dirty looks from friends who struggle with weight to know that nobody appreciates me talking about how lazy I am or how terrible my diet is when the absolute largest I’ve ever been (which is right now) is 127 lbs.

I understand that me talking about struggling to exercise is like hearing Kanye West preach about humility, and I don’t want this blog to come off as pretentious. I know I’m skinny. And given my terrible diet (Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, Oreos, cheesecake!) and whopping ≤ 3 hours of exercise a week, my figure is mostly due to genetics, just like a great deal of my friends who are shunned by Abercrombie and Fitch struggle with weight due to genetics. I also know that genetics are only kind for so long in situations like mine, and I know I won’t stay skinny after a decade and a couple of kids if I continue to remain idle and shovel junk down my throat.