The Joys of Exercise…
… Yes, believe it or not, there are some!! I know it’s hard to believe that doing something that makes you feel like you are dying a slow and painful death could be associated with the word “joy”, but let me enlighten you.
First off, my health and fitness freak of a dad will be so proud of me for this post. After all, I suppose I get some (or most) of my own health and fitness freakishness from him. If there’s one thing we can both agree on, it’s this: handfuls of spinach are a great snack on the go. Sticks are a close second.
So, tonight is an unusually quiet Saturday night for me. Not that I’m typically out bar hopping every weekend, but there’s often something going on around the house. However, tonight is an exception. On a side note, I’m fully aware that I, at age 20, am less cool and social than my parents who, in their 50s, have an impressive social life and go to more parties and have more friends than I can even try to compete with. At least now that I’ve moved out I don’t see them having more fun than me so I can pretend they aren’t… I think I might be doing this whole university experience thing all wrong, but at least my liver will thank me for it. Anywho….
There are many reasons why tonight is not too exciting around here. First of all, my live-in best friend/cousin/partner in co-existence is, in fact, not living-in this weekend (how dare she leave me. You know who you are *CLAIRE*) and my other live-in, forced-to-be-my-friends aka roommates are watching a TV show that I have not caught up with yet. Michael has hockey practice followed by poker night with his teammates (could there be a more typical boys’ night?!) and my other wonderful and, you guessed it, forced friend, Alex (this time forced not by living situation but by blood, cuz cousinship is a beautiful thing) is busy doing cool things that cool people who live downtown do on weekends (I don’t actually know what she is doing but since she is busy I’m assuming it’s something totally hip and interesting that my little hermit mind cannot comprehend). Another quick side note (sorry I am ramble-y as heck): I just want to take a moment to say thank you to my dad and his siblings for all having babies around the same time… I am so lucky that I have cousins close in age who are obligated to be my friends that I also kinda like as humans, which is a plus. I clearly only have people here that are forced to be my friends based on living under the same roof or by blood relations. Thank you mom, dad, and siblings. You have #blessed my existence with lifelong friends. Now back to the point…
This lack of available companions left me with a night wide open for whatever on Earth I wanted to do… without leaving the comfort of my own home, of course, because I ain’t got no car or anyone to go out and see anyway.
I weighed my options: I could do some maaaajor homework preparation, like, 2 weeks in advance preparation. Yes, I am such a perfect student that I have done all the work I need done in the next two weeks… granted, this isn’t the busiest time for me school-wise so it’s not actually that impressive. But I’m still awesome. This option would definitely put my mind at ease for upcoming assignments, but was it worth sacrificing my Saturday night to do some homework that was highly unnecessary?
The other option was to have a total self-care pamper night. Oh, the contrast of my night and Michael’s night… Hockey practice and poker game vs. face mask and chick flick… We could not be having more opposite evenings.
As you can probably guess, I decided on the latter: a night totally dedicated to taking care of myself. I started it off by doing an intense full body workout (this is the part where you’re supposed to be proud of me, dad). It felt GREAT and after a week or two of being completely uninterested in working out, I finally felt motivated and back into the groove.
This motivation may or may not have had something to do with the entire box of vegan chocolate chip cookies I bought and devoured in the last 24 hours…
After my kick butt sweat sesh (lol), I put on a face mask, took a relaxing shower, and hopped into bed to watch some episodes of Sex and The City… Come on, it’s the best chick flick TV show of all time! I must admit, I love a good chick flick. I suppose it’s my “guilty pleasure” but I got no shame about it. I just can’t resist a feel-good, lovey dovey movie (or show) with hilarious female roles who also happen to have dreamy wardrobes. Sue me.
I now realize this post is all over the place and is not at all what I initially intended it to be, but I’m going with it. Thank goodness this isn’t a writing assignment or I would definitely be docked major points for my poor organizational skills. Let’s retrace my steps… I started by titling this “the joys of exercise” with full intentions to talk about how rewarding it feels to tackle a good workout and the anxiety-relieving benefits that come along with it. As someone who suffers with pretty serious anxiety, I sort of hate to admit it, but working out really is the best medicine. When you just focus on working hard and sweating it out, those magical endorphins flood in, completely freeing your mind of any anxious thoughts. They just fly away with every kick and jump; it’s really the only anxiety medication I could ever need. Plus it’s free! AND it has a million billion other health benefits as well, so you just can’t go wrong.
Now that I’ve covered all my bases, I shall sign off. Thank you for sticking with me through this mumble jumble post. I don’t know what the point of this was or how my love of chick flicks managed to sneak in there, but I’m rolling with it.
Happy Saturday to all and may you have a wonderful week full of spinach, exercise, and those magical, anxiety-relieving endorphins.
Until next time,
Tal
