Since being broken, I've had to re-think a lot of things, but primarily I've had to re-think movement. My metabolism has slowed down significantly - I no longer snarf down my food and usually can't finish even a plateful. I also chew a lot slower, having become less rushed and more contemplative in general. (It scares me a lot, actually.)The biggest issue, though - the eternal question - is how to get back in shape. I had surgery on my leg (are you tired of hearing about this yet? I am!) and couldn't move it for several weeks. This was long enough to all but completely lose all the muscle in my right leg. It was a toothpick.
Physical therapy has been extremely encouraging. I've gone from feeling like I would never walk again to being able to start jogging as of this week. But I'm having trouble remembering how to be an athlete - how do I get back in shape again??
Since the end of January I've been attempting to devise workout routines for myself, but it seems, largely, that I've just lost all motivation. Besides that, I have trouble sticking to schedules, getting started on things, and I have a lot of leftover laziness from my long stint of laying around watching Netflix.
Then some epiphany came to me, and now I'm back to working out all the time.
You probably think I'm kidding, but I'm not.
I took a look at my past life: like I said, I was moving constantly, on my own accord.
What if I just started moving?
My lifestyle (of writing all the time) is more sitting-down-based than ever before, so actually moving has become more of a challenge. So I thought, what if I just determined that for a set amount of time, sometime in the day (mornings work best for me), I would just start moving and not stop till the time was over?
So that's what I did.
I started small; as I mentioned, I've only recently begun to regain the muscle back in my leg; for a while I was unable to stand up by myself. Then the workout was only my physical therapy, which took about 15 minutes. When I was better off, I moved my arms a bit and did some stretches for my back. I worked up to half an hour.
Now I am at an hour and feeling SO GOOD I could burst! I love feeling strong. I love feeling accomplished. And it's all just giving myself an hour in which to move constantly, however I please that day.
Here is what I did yesterday morning:
After a little stretching, I followed this for the first 15 minutes:
I found it on Pinterest, and it most certainly is a challenging workout all on its own!
I continued with half an hour mainly of physical therapy leg-stuff, coupled with some extra arm, back, and core moves that I've found complement the PT (I will do a more detailed post on this particular workout soon). To top it off, I spent the last 15 minutes half on the stationary bike and half jogging to the stop sign and back a couple of times.
All of this to say, I highly recommend the "How much can I move" workout! You can do an hour, or two, or three: or you can do 45 minutes, 30 minutes, 15, 10, even 5 - the point is, you are moving!!
Some things you might want to think about as you start your "Moving Time":
- What muscles are most important to me, what areas do I need to work on?
- What movements with those muscles/groups are most important to me, how do I want to utilize these muscles in my daily life?
- What skills do I want to work up to (e.g. athletic goals - rock climbing, running, yoga, etc.)
I hope this helps anybody who is feeling stuck! Let me know. :-)
