Movement and Mindset
I always hear the phrase “move your body for at least 30 minutes a day” because “it’ll make you feel better” and in all honesty, I’ve found myself saying it on my Instagram as well. I’m not saying I don’t agree but I do think the way it’s promoted can be misleading, especially when it’s paired with “even if you don’t feel like it, do it anyways”. I try to move my body for at least 45 minutes a day because I have more energy and it makes me feel good. The key word in that sentence is try. Moving your body for 30 minutes is great, except if you have a newborn who has you up all night or your job has you traveling 4 out of the 5 days a week. I know the phrase isn’t meant to sound like you should do it no matter what but for some (raises hand), it probably feels that way. I used to work out every day for at least an hour. I felt great and actually enjoyed that time.
Then I started a job that was a whirlwind – weird hours, networking events after work, Saturdays spent working 16 hours. It got to me and I started cutting out things to give myself more time to rest. It just so happened the thing I cut was my work out time.
Same goes for when I started my last job. The company had a personal trainer come in twice a week that I took full advantage of. However, travel picked up and I was on and off a plane 13 times last year.
It was hard for me to motivate myself to get up early or go to the hotel gym late at night after a 12+ hour workday. I felt guilty because I wasn’t getting my “movement” in and I put movement in quotations because I had just been on my feet running around for 12+ hours and had walked over 10,000 steps. I moved, that’s for sure! It just wasn’t a lift weights or do a 2-mile run kind of workout. That doesn’t mean I didn’t get my activity in for the day. It also doesn’t mean that I wasn’t feeling the guilt of not doing the standard workout.
At the end of the day, maybe this is just my internal struggle, but I have a hunch that more of you feel this way as well. It’s hard to shift your mindset when the world and social media are telling you one thing on repeat. For example, someone who has status and is a huge proponent of moving your body for at least 30 minutes a day will wake up at 4am to work out before a day full of press and interviews. After seeing that, my mind automatically guilt trips me in to thinking well if they can do it, then I should be able to get up at 5am because I’m not doing press interviews. WRONG! Comparison is a nasty thing and yet it is so engrained in our daily lives that sometimes you might not even realize it’s happening until you reflect back. That’s how it was for me and working out. I thought I had to move my body every day. I tried to wake up earlier to workout before coffee. That’s just not my thing. This girl needs coffee before…well anything. So whether you get up at 4am or need your coffee first, you’re doing it the right way for you!
There are going to be bad days. Days where you don’t get enough sleep. Days where baby kept you up all night. Or just days where you want to rest. Those are ok days to have. Just because one person checks working out off their list every day (and maybe you even used to be that person) does not mean it’s what is best for you in this season of life. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, every single body is different. That’s what makes us so unique. We just have to remember that guidelines someone else has set for their life is not the guideline for life. Take the bits and pieces that work best for you and your lifestyle and turn them into your own routine that you can be proud of and most importantly feel good about.
Now pass the bubbly,
Jess