Exercise excuses....seven minutes???

My exercise had been sporadic of late. I have grand plans but then they fall apart. The only thing I am consistently doing is Zumba.   Zumba on Monday and Tuesday is a habit!  Habits are a good thing.

I have dreams and goals.  I have a dream of beating my PR at my next 5k....I have a goal of a possible half marathon later this year.  I need to be working out if I want to see these goals and dreams come to fruition.  I struggle.   It's not really even excuses.  It's time. It's learning how to fit it in to my lifestyle and around my husbands whims.  

So when I saw the seven minute workout I was quite interested.  Do I think it's a substitute for a full body cardio, blood pumping workout?  No!   But would it be a quick easy addition to my day?  Yes!  

I headed into this short workout with very minimal upper body strength.  Strength training had been spotty at best.  Yes, I know I need to fix that....thus my decision to try out this mini workout!!!

This morning I prepared myself to get down to business for 7 minutes.  Basically the picture above shows each of the moves you do.   Simply do each move for 30 seconds and voila...7 minutes!    I don't know if it's important to move through the exercises in the exact order.  I can only assume so in order to let certain muscles rest whilst still moving.   

I started.....Jumping jacks!   Easy, no problem.  I was feeling quite cocky with myself at this point, thinking it was going to all be a piece of cake!   30 seconds down and I moved on to the wall sit.  15 seconds in and my legs were burning!!!  Wowzers.  

Next up, push ups.  I hit my first snag.  Have I mentioned that my upper body strength is lame at best?  Yeah, sissy push ups for me.  On wobbly arms I made my thirty seconds.  

Thirty abdominal crunches later...they weren't too bad (thank you Zumba instructor Anita for all of the an work we do).  Step ups.....and here is where I noticed it.  2 minutes of actual exercise and I was starting to get a little heated.  The squats were next, I could feel my muscles quivering a bit.  By the time the tricep dips came around it was official!  I was breathing hard and sweating!    Was totally not expecting that!  Not at all!

I finished up the rest of the twelve moves.  I could feel it.  My muscles were worked.  

I really struggled with the two push-ups.  Yikes!  At least I figured out where my issues are!!!  I do think that his workout would be one that if done consistently would be quickly outgrown.  Then I would simply need to become a 14 minute workout I guess. 

I think that this workout will be something I try to incorporate into my daily life.    Who can't find seven minutes???   

Some days

Tuesday night I went to Zumba and I was on fire.  My body felt good.  I had energy.  I pushed myself and jumped more and higher and harder.  It was an awesome hour!

Last night, Wednesday I did another hour of Zumba and it was night and day different from the previous night.  I was tired before I began.  I just wanted to pay down.   The difference was apparent almost instantaneously as I began to sweat profusely.  My clothes felt heavy on my body.  My legs felt like dead weight.   Part of me wanted to quit.  I wasn't sure if I could even make it.  My movements became more slow and sluggish.  But I told myself that this was all in my head and I ramped up my movements.

I powered through the workout.  It wasn't a killer workout but I did my best.  I jumped and moved as much as my body would accommodate.  I wasn't stopping because of a little discomfort (some of which I know was from a mental block!). 

I'm sore today.  My legs feel as if they have been through a war.   Am I happy that I pushed through?  Absolutely!

Some days exercise will be more of a struggle and and I wont do a good, go as far or push myself as much.  Some days the victory is just in finishing!   Some days  our strength and determination is challenged.  I accept the challenge!  

Water boarding

Chinese Water Torture doesn't have a chance against the workout that I just found for myself.  Water-boarding, that's for sissies in comparison to this workout!   This workout is pure torture.  Absolute!  Let me tell you how this torture came about.  I sit at work.  I have a lot of down time.  I had read a story awhile back, (sorry, can't remember where) about a gal who took one break at work, changed into workout clothes and tennis shoes and climbed up and down the steps of the building where she worked.  I thought about how cool that was. But even more so I thought about what an awesome way to get a quick 15 minutes of activity in.  After all, 15 minutes is better than nothing in the middle of a day where I'm just sitting around on my keister.  I talked about it at work.  I decided that I could break my lunch down (we only get a half hour paid lunch, no other breaks per say......haa haa haa, if you know me you are probably saying she needs a break from what? sitting at her desk and reading or working on a cross stitch project between customers!  haa haa haa).  Anyway, I digress. I had originally decided that I could break down that half hour.  15 minutes for eating and 15 minutes for stair climbing.  I had the best intentions.  Really I did.  But I kept 'forgetting' about my plan.  I forgot to bring my tennis shoes.  I didn't want to get all hot.  I didn't want to rush my lunch.  What if I got back and was panting like a dog and a customer needed my attention?    Excuses excuses excuses.  And then it hit me.  The last two hours I'm here, I rarely do anything.  I get no customers...and I'm only here to be the second person and as a supervisory override for the person that is doing the work and occasionally back them up if they get more than one thing at once or if they have to run to the bathroom. (yeah, my job is a piece of cake.).  I devised a plan that if I left the one door open, that worker could easily call out and I'd be able to be there in a jiffy.  That way I could do my stair climb thing after that time when I wouldn't have to worry as much about scarfing down my lunch and  being all hot and having a customer come up to me while I'm panting from exertion!  So yesterday  I threw my tennis shoes into my bag.  The hour rolled around when my time to do the steps was upon me.  I won't lie and say I didn't think about making an excuse.  I did.  But I totally ignored it!  But then I just said no wayI'm doing this!!  And I put on my tennis shoes.  I started strong. I was counting my flights,  but around 15 trips up and down I lost track.   We are only in a one story building so it literally is 8 steps up....make the turn on the landing.....8 steps up......swivel on foot on the top landing....8 steps down...make the turn on the landing....8 steps down.....swivel on foot and back up.  16 steps up...16 steps down.   That 15 minutes went by soooo SLOW!   But my heart beat was up.  I was hot.  I was sweaty.  My legs were ON FIRE!!! (look at those pink cheeks....which isn't all that visible in the picture,but even my arms were RED!)   I LOVE IT!  I had grand plans to go 30 minutes...but 15 was quite enough for my first day.  I did learn that I need to leave my cell phone at the bottom (otherwise I checked the time every minute and consequentially moan because only one minute had passed and I was soooo ready to stop). I also need to devise a way to count my flights easily so I can mark my progress!  Today my calves are tight, but I'm not in pain or really hurting.  So upward and onward!(by the way, I'm not mocking water-boarding,  I'm just poking fun at my workout and simply saying how difficult that 15 minutes really was for me)

Today there is a small potluck here at work to celebrate my co-workers birthday. I will be partaking a bit.  But a BIT is the operative word.  I don't have to eat a hogs load of food! I can do this!  I made cookies for the potluck.  Banana-chocolate-peanut butter cookies.  My husband calls these cookies crack, because they are that scrumptious that you just can't stop.  Seriously, how COULD you go wrong with those three things together.  Not exactly healthy, but good none-the-less.  I had ONE cookie last night (and yes, I had the calories set aside for it!).

I've tried the deprivation routine with my lifestyle.  Saying "MaryFran, you are not allowed to have any cookies..."  (insert voice over of Adam Sandler in the movie Waterboy here) "mam, mam mam maamaa says that cookies are the devil!"  That doesn't work any longer.  I want the changes that I'm making to be for the rest of my life.  It's not going to work if I say I will never have another cookie...or another piece of cake....or pizza from the greasy joint that serves the best pizza.  It's unrealistic and just sets me up for failure.    I ate a smidgen of the cookie dough and I ate ONE small cookie.  Yes, I actually said I ate ONE cookie.  The thing is, I didn't eat 6 cookies...or a dozen cookies.....I didn't even eat two cookies.  I ate one cookie.  I gathered my will power and ate my one cookie and then I walked away. 

I am not saying that I can do that everyday.  I'm not saying that cookies (or pizza or cake or any number of foods) are not trigger foods.  They are.  They trigger me to want to eat and eat and eat. However, I know that I have to figure out how to manage to still have these ultra yummy favorite things in my life, in essence how to partake, hear the trigger and stomp the *&^#  out of the trigger.  It's LIFE and I'm losing weight so I can LIVE....and that includes baking cookies for a co-workers  birthdays.  I can't bury my head in a corner and refuse to live.     If I hadn't felt as if I was  feeling strong enough to know that I could resist the temptation, I would not have made them.  This week I made cookies to celebrate life.   I won!  (as a side note, the cookies, half came to work today to be scarfed down by my co-workers and the other half are going with my husband to his work for his clients!)
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Nothing is slowing me down!  I'm stomping on the stress in terms of my weight loss. I am not succumbing to the temptation to eat away my sorrows! 

Great Workout

Well, first of all....got on the scales today and found that I was 1 pound heavier than yesterday. Now that can be water. So I'm not stressing. However, unless I do a massive drop like I did the other week, I'm not going to make my end of month goal. I'm not stressin' over it though. Slow and easy is the ONLY way to do this in order for it to be a 'life' altering experience. My goal of 2 pounds a week...is pretty bold...but managable...AND healthy! I'm still pretty much on target...even with having sat for the last few weeks without moving the scales!

OK....my workout! Yesterday we went to the gym. I started on the elliptical trainer. I was on it and even though I wasn't exactly lazing, I decided that I was going to push it up a notch. Every five minutes I reversed it for one minute before going back to foward. Reverse just about kills me...so this was pushing me. I felt VERY good when I got off the elliptical. I then went and did the weights...I pushed my weights up a notch....5-10 pounds more in some cases. Just enough to REALLY feel the burn! :-) So today we went back to the gym. I did the treadmill today......I pushed my speed up to the point where I could walk but just barely....and every five minutes I pushed it up to a point that it was either jog or fall off the back of the treadmill. My lungs were sucking in air for that minute before I pushed it back down. SO....I did like 8 total minutes jogging out of 45. May not seem like much....but it is monumental for me. I haven't run anywhere for YEARS!