When Sam posted about her bike streak, I was inspired. In her second post, she wrote about her “back at it” attitude to interrupted streaks. You see, I’m ordinarily more of a “I’ve interrupted my streak, that’s it” sort of person, or even the sort of person who doesn’t join a “30 days of” or whatever challenge because I just know life will get in the way. External accountability works very well for me as a motivator most of the time, so you’d think the group aspect of some of these challenges would make me a fan. But if I know in advance I won’t be able to commit for instance to a full 30 days of something, it becomes more of a deterrent. And that is normally the case – something will always come up during 30 days that will prevent me from doing the whole thing “properly”, and the perfectionist in me is against that.
But since last Sunday, I’ve decided to do my own private yoga mini-streak: yoga every day until Christmas, or at least until my last day of work (21 December), before I interrupt my daily routine for the end of year festivities. No external accountability. No hard feelings.
I’ve recently had a bit of health stuff going on, so I’m technically forbidden from hard exercise until at least Thursday next week (medical advice differs on just how long I should avoid swimming and running, but that is a topic for another post). Since I feel fine and need some movement in my life, I decided to test the waters last Sunday with an hour of moderate-intensity yoga. It was thoroughly enjoyable, so I decided that this would be my go-to daily workout until I can resume normal activities.
Photo by rawpixel on Unsplash
So here are my “rules”. They’re not very rule-y at all:
- Do yoga every day for 10-15 minutes in the morning, or longer on weekends. 10-15 minutes isn’t much, but at least it’s something. And when I have time, I can do more. This morning, for example, I did a 40-minute flow for strength.
- I’m allowed to replace yoga by another activity if I want. For instance, tomorrow I plan to reintroduce some gentle bouldering into my routine, so I probably won’t do yoga on that day, except for maybe some cool-down asanas after bouldering.
- But of course I can also do my yoga in the morning and swim in the evening or run in the afternoon, once I’m cleared to return to the pool and the road!
- If life gets in the way of yoga on a couple of days, so be it. I’m not going to beat myself up about it. It could very well happen, with all the pre-holiday commitments that are going on.
This week has worked out great so far. I’ve been trying to listen to my body to make sure I don’t overdo it. For example, on Thursday I got my flu shot, and so on Friday morning I did a hands-free flow to avoid irritating my arm. Youtube is truly amazing; you can find flows for essentially any life situation on there.
To be honest, I’m starting to go a little stir-crazy from the lack of the sort of regular movement I’m used to, but the yoga is helping. So here’s to my mini-streak!
Like you, I tend to be a bit hard on myself if I quit a streak, so then I often don’t start a streak. That said, I’m on day 6 of a mini-streak of meditation. I only ask myself to do 10 mins a day. And I’m trying to counsel myself in advance not to fall off the wagon completely, if I miss a day. My goal is to keep it up through January 1.
Mini streaks are the best! I’ve never been able to commit to a 30 day challenge even though in my mind I was ready, but the way life happens committing to a 30 challenge would never work. I’m on a mini yoga and mediations streak till Christmas…. so far so go!