Thursday, September 17, 2009

YOGA

Now. As a trainer I know how important flexibility is for the body, but I rarely do more that 5ish minutes of stretching at the end of my workouts. I know this is not ok and I know I need to do more. A lot of time, my body tells me to stretch more and I ignore it and move on.

The thing is, I have always felt intimidated by the things I am not good at. I know, call me crazy....or human, but the things I am not good at don't happen to be fun either. Going to a yoga class was nothing I wanted to do because I had gone to yoga before and I was not good at it. That frustrates me.
Well, this Saturday during an 8 mile training run I mentioned the desire/need to start doing yoga and was swearing to myself that Sunday was going to be the day. My body felt tight and heavy during the run....I knew I needed a good stretch.

I knew Scott Fitness offered a class on Sunday and I was in...committed....practically there.

I didn't go.

These are the real reasons for my absense:
1. I don't like the idea of a 90 minute class just starting out
2. 2 in the afternoon is so inconvenient for me.

So this week I made a plan to do yoga...for real this time.

I tried my first class on Tuesday and then went back again on Thursday. The class was amazing and didn't make me feel like a complete failure for 50 minutes. We did some great stretching and especially focused on the back of the body....the back, hamstrings, neck....all the places I feel the most tight.

The exciting thing that happened is that I saw improvement right away. The forward bend was uncomfortable in the beginning of class, but by the end of class I had my hands on the floor much more comfortably....and then by Thursday I had improved just a little bit more.

Now....let me go back to Wednesday where I had a scheduled training run of 5 miles. I entered the run thinking I would go at least 4 miles, but I felt so great and was running faster than I had in awhile. 5 miles was done in no time.

Now, was this because of the yoga? I don't know. maybe.

What I do know is yoga will only benefit me and I am so glad I incorporated it into my routine.

I hope you make more of an effort to try the things outside of your comfort zone. The variety will only improve who you are.


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