Feminist reflections on fitness, sport, and health
Author: Christine Hennebury
I'm a writer/storyteller/director/creativity & lifestory coach with a black belt in ITF Taekwon-do. I read voraciously and I write like my fingers are on fire.
I'm the founder and Chair of the Association for the Arts in Mount Pearl and I'm a former president of the St. John's Storytelling Festival.
I bake a mean chocolate chip cookie.
My last two posts have been really introspective and reflective as I slowly adjust to a world without my Dad in it. I have really appreciated your supportive comments and your messages via email and Facebook.
I have lots more to say about grief and movement and mindfulness but I haven’t gotten those thoughts into shareable form yet.
So, instead, I am falling back on a Go Team post:
My dear Team, please, please please, cut yourself some slack.
Nobody feels on top of things.
Everyone I know is feeling overwhelmed.
Just about every conversation I hear is full of apologies, full of explanations of delays, and descriptions of things people intended to do but didn’t quite get to.
And while I appreciate the fact that we all feel the need to explain, I would love to see us all recognize the fact that everyone is doing their best with the time, energy, and resources that they have.
We are all dealing with a lot of expectations from ourselves and from other people and often those expectations aren’t particularly reasonable.
There is NOTHING to be gained by being hard on ourselves about the ways that we fall short.
Instead, we need to be kinder to ourselves.
And not just when we fall short of expectations. We need to be kinder to ourselves when we are making plans or creating expectations in the first place.
We need to give ourselves a break.
We’re just a bunch of humans who are, frankly, poorly trained for the world we are living in and we are doing our best to respond appropriately to a variety of pressures.
Sure, there are ways we can improve those responses and there are ways to ensure that our actions align more closely with our values but those changes can only come from a place of self-compassion.
Like all of those memes say – if self-judgement worked, we’d all be perfect by now.
So let’s pour some energy into self-compassion, hey?
Here’s your gold star for your efforts to cut yourself some slack today.
Image description: a drawing of a cartoonish gold happy face star with a background of blue lines with a sprinkle of small blue dots.
Please note: Despite my whimsical title, this post is about grief. Proceed with caution.
A friend of mine jokingly refers to smart watches as ‘wrist spies.’ Since she says it without malice or judgement, I find it hilarious and I’ve started using the term on a regular basis.
As spies go, though, it has been failing this past week. It might end up having to come in from the cold.
On Sunday, I received a notification that my ‘Mindfulness’ minutes are down this week and I immediately said, aloud, “Shows what you know, Wrist Spy!”
(By the way, if me talking to an inanimate object makes you concerned for my state of mind, rest easy. I do it all the time and, so far, my wrist spy is the only object that talks back to me. And that only happens when I say her name…or, let’s be honest here, anything that sounds like her name.)
Seriously though, I thought it was pretty funny that my wrist spy was calling my attention to my mindfulness because this past week has been one of the most mindful times of my life.
As you know from last week’s post, my Dad passed away on May 6th.
I’ve spent the last week thinking about him, about his life, about our lives, and about what the world looks like without my Dad in it.
I had lots to do but I was never trying to keep busy to avoid thinking. Yet, I didn’t end up ruminating either. I just sat (or stood, or walked) with whatever came up.
I’m not trying to cast myself as a perfect model of emotional maturity and mindfulness here, this was more by fluke than by design.
And, it helped that the tasks I took on – writing the obituary, writing and delivering the eulogy – not only gave me some good structures for my thinking, they were also the types of practices I do to help me process big emotions.
I didn’t consciously choose those tasks to serve that purpose but my subconscious was clearly on the case this time.
So, instead of spending my time thinking about the fact that my Dad is gone, I could spend my time thinking about how he lived and who he was, and how his spirit lives on in his family and friends.
All of that thinking felt very mindful, very in-the-moment to me.
And when I started to cry, I just let myself cry until the worst of the feeling had passed.
When I felt overwhelmed, I breathed through it. Sometimes I did that on my own, sometimes because my husband said, “You’re breathing fast, try to slow it down.”
And, I found myself noticing everything so sharply and clearly.
I saw crocuses on a lawn when I was out for a walk with the dog. I looked at them closely – the petals, the colours, the leaves – and I had a flash thought that my Dad won’t ever see flowers like that again. He wasn’t big into flowers or anything but the thought still welled up. Instead of getting carried off into grief about the things he would miss, I, luckily, was able to choose to notice them for him. I paid close attention to the colours, the contrasts, the petals and leaves, and how they stood out against the dull grass.
Image Description: a cluster of crocuses ( a few yellow and a few each of three shades of purple) surrounded by winter-worn grass.
And I drank my (many, many) cups of tea slowly, letting the mug warm my hands and letting the scent and taste wash over me.
I turned my face to the sun when it came out, feeling warmed and hopeful and bright, despite the circumstances.
I talked with so many people who knew Dad and I paid attention to the details they shared with me and leaned into the connection to him.
And, I did a hundred other small things that felt mindful and kept me present.
On Friday, as I was waiting before the memorial service began, I played some songs from a playlist that I created – Songs that make me think of Pete *- and I sat and breathed slowly and felt like things would be ok.
Ever since listening so carefully on Friday, a few lines from Itchycoo Park by Small Faces have been floating up over and over in my brain, reminding me of the good things in the world even during this challenging time.
(What did you feel there?) well, I cried (But why the tears there?) tell you why It’s all too beautiful, it’s all too beautiful It’s all too beautiful, it’s all too beautiful
Obviously, I’m having a very different kind experience than the main character in the song m. His ability to notice the beauty around him hinged on the substances he took. I am looking for and feeling the beauty around me because the intensity of my emotions is making everything very vivid right now.
While it isn’t always easy, this vivid sense of awareness means I have been very “present” from moment to moment for the past week or so.
I’m feeling all the difficult feelings, I am acutely aware of my experiences, and I am sharply attuned to the beautiful things around me like crocuses and hot cups of tea and my friends rallying to support me.
And all of that adds up to mindfulness even if it isn’t happening in a way that a wrist spy can track.
My watch may be spying on me but it doesn’t know everything.
*Please note, some of these songs are from my Dad’s youth and hence some of the lyrics are sketchy at best. Please don’t judge my Dad for the songs he liked then and please don’t assume that he held every value (or lack thereof) expressed in every song. I included them in my playlist because they make me think of Dad singing them.
He’s been unwell for a long, long time but it was a ‘might live a long long time’ type of frailty, not a ‘could pass any time’ sort of illness so losing him on Saturday was sudden and jarring.
I am sad, disoriented, and unfocused and every muscle in my body has been tense since Saturday.
But even amidst grief, ordinary life details must continue and holding on to those routines is helping me to put one foot in front of another while I make my way forwards.
Khalee and I have been going for walks.
Image description: a light haired dog looks back toward the camera. She is standing on a sidewalk next to some winter-worn grass.
I’ve been drawing a daily monster.
Every May, I set a drawing challenge for myself to create MAYbe 20 Monsters. This year the monsters are giving advice. Obviously this one was a note to self. Image description: a drawing of a teardrop shaped purple and blue monster with big glasses with text to the right that reads “Terri wants to remind you that it is okay to feel however you feel. “Go ahead and feeling your feelings,” she says, “Let them wash over you like a wave and they will pass.” She knows it isn’t easy to do but it will get easier in time.”
I’ve been meditating. (On Sunday, it was warm enough to lie in my saucer swing to meditate.)
Image description: the view upwards from my saucer swing – the black rope from the swing, some bare branches and a cloudy sky with some blue peeking through.
And I have been doing yoga.
I really liked how straightforward and direct this video was and how she didn’t try to be soft and singsong when she spoke.
A video from the SaraBethYoga YouTube channel. The still image shows a person with brown hair and a yellow shirt leaning to one side to stretch their neck. The background of the image is purple and white text reads ‘Grief Yoga Neck & Shoulders.’
And all of those are keeping me moving forward, literally and metaphorically.
I’m being kind to myself about it, I’m going slowly, I’m being gentle with this new version of me, I’m moving with/in/through grief.
My Dad was Peter Hennebury, a mostly-Civil Engineer, who loved bad jokes and thick books. He had a quick wit, a sharp tongue and a equal penchant for both formality and irreverence.
He was and is loved.
If you are so inclined, please raise your next cup of tea or coffee to Pete.
Yes, these grumpy faces are deliberate and they are a joke. Image description: a photo of me and my Dad with grumpy expressions on our faces. He’s a thin older man with grey hair and glasses, wearing a collared shirt and a hoodie. I’m a middle aged woman with a round face and light brown hair and glasses wearing a black hoodie.
I may not have my own goals for this month quite figured out yet but I’m definitely going to be borrowing some ideas from this month’s Action for Happiness calendar.
Meaningful May!
Finding meaning in our tasks, actions, and plans is good for our brains and for our hearts.
Image description: a quote from William James that reads ‘Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.’ The text is in pale yellow against a light orange background. On the right hand side is a cartoon drawing of a person marching while holding a sign with a heart drawn on it. The words ‘Action for Happiness’ are on the bottom on a small banner extending from the left side.
Here’s this month’s calendar:
Image description: a calendar of daily tips for Meaningful May. Individual calendar blocks are either red, pink, light blue or dark blue and the edges of the calendar are decorated with cartoon drawings of someone drawing, two cups of tea or coffee, a tree, a sunrise, etc.
Here’s a video about Meaningful May from Vanessa King, Head of Psychology at Action for Happiness.
Obviously, you don’t have to take on another daily practice if you don’t want to.
However, it could be fun to pick a few things from the calendar to try this month.
Christine and The Updates sounds like a very annoying cover band.
I can only presume they would pop up when you were in the middle of something and tell you that you had to listen to them. You could listen right now or you could schedule a time to listen to them later but you were going to hear their songs whether you wanted to or not.
And, of course, if you were about to do something very important and time sensitive, they would start a long, uninterruptible set. 😉
ANYWAY, enough of my extended and funny-to-me-at-least analogy.
One of the things that I fear when writing for this blog is that I am going to promise to follow up on something and then forget all about it. For example, that I might create a challenge for myself or say that I am going to do something for the next month and then either forget all about doing it or forget that I said I would follow up.
Have I done this already on the blog?
More than likely.
Have I done it recently?
Maybe.
And that’s what this post is about!
Here are some updates on a few things I have mentioned in the past few months:
Fitness Journaling
When I last talked about reflective fitness journaling, I was finding it very useful. It was giving me a ‘container’ for thinking about the how and the why of my various exercises, providing me with a way to celebrate my successes, and allowing me to consider how to adjust things without judging myself for them.
I’m happy to report that I am still finding all of those positives in my fitness journaling practice.
I have moved to a digital journal instead of a paper one because it is easier for me to be consistent that way. I set a reminder for every Monday and when it goes off, I open my exercise journal document and dictate my thoughts on my exercise habits over the past week.
Once I have written this week’s entry, I reread last week’s and if anything has changed or if I want to add anything to the current entry or change any of my plans for the week ahead.
My 6 Week Fitness Plus Workout Plan
I started out strong with this plan and had a helpful epiphany about sore muscles but then I ran into a bit of a snag timewise and painwise and while I was able to reframe that snag into a reminder that I am trying to tell myself a story of consistent exercise not the story of a 6 week plan, I was finding it more and more difficult to get myself to do those exercises.
I actually had to coach myself out of this one.
Lots of my clients object when I try to get them to work on their projects little by little (something I struggle with myself) because it feels like there is ‘no point’ in doing 2 or 5 or 10 minutes work on a project that will take ages to complete.
That’s when I gently remind them (and me!) of two things 1) When you are struggling with a project, you start by creating the habit of working on it. The tasks related to the project itself get done as a side effect of creating that habit. 2) Doing any amount of work on a regular basis is way better than holding out for a perfect work session that you can never get around to.
I really enjoyed the 20 minute sessions I did but they were wreaking havoc with my schedule and with the side of my knee. I found myself avoiding them, putting them off to late in the day, or planning to do them ‘tomorrow’ – not an actual tomorrow, a mysterious, non-existent tomorrow.
So, I have gone back to doing 10 minute sessions for the foreseeable future and I’ve left the 6 Week Plan behind for now.
The latest news on the meditation front is that I seem to have shifted my thinking from meditation as something I *have* to do into considering meditation as something I *get* to do.
I have found myself looking forward to those few minutes of stillness and breathing.
Somehow, I never made a decision about whether April was real but it does seem to have existed and now we’re into May.
Clearly May is real, or at least the first two days are, but I haven’t made a lot of plans for this month yet.
Sooooooo, be prepared for an encore from Christine and the Updates next week!
*The crowd goes wild*
Photo by Adam Whitlock on UnsplashImage description: an excited crowd at an event shaking open packages of coloured powder in the air so the air above them is filled with splashes of colour.
Ok, the crowd rolls its eyes and Christine laughs maniacally because, like a computer update, she’s going to do her thing, no matter what.
She will also talk about herself in the third person which is kind of weird but she’s rolling with it.
In last week’s post, I told you I was starting a meditation experiment. The plan was to try reframing my meditation as if it were one of my medications – something I ‘take’ regularly that provides benefits over time. And, hence, to anchor my meditation practice to taking my other meds each morning.
How did that go?
Let’s say results were mixed.
The reframing part, the *idea* of meditation as medication is a good approach for me.
Considering meditation as a necessary component for my well-being is really helpful. With this approach, embracing meditation as a self-prescribed medication, the practice becomes less of a ‘task to get done’ and more part of the foundation of my daily life.
Yes, it has only been a week but I can feel the shift in my own perception and it feels good.
I’m not feeling a lot of the ‘give myself some extra brainspace’ benefits yet but it has only been a week.
I am, however, finding that it is much easier to actually start a meditation than it was at the beginning of last week. AND my meditation itself feels a bit better, a little more breath-focused, a little less scattered.
So, from that perspective, my experiment results are very encouraging.
However, the second aspect of my experiment?
Not so much.
In fact, trying to link the practice with my tangible medications was an abject failure.
As I had guessed, that part of overall my day is a little too unpredictable to include meditation.
And in attempting to link my meds to my med, I found myself taking my doctor-prescribed meds a bit later. Taking them later is not only less-than-ideal for my health and concentration, it increases the risk that I will forget them entirely.
After 3 days, I reassessed and decided that the link in timing was not all that important to me, but the change in perspective was vital.
So, I abandoned the idea and just included my meditation whenever felt best each day.
In fact, after a very busy day on Friday, I ended my meditation at 11:59PM. Just under the wire for a planned ‘daily’ practice, but it still counted!
Overall, this approach is working – it’s easier to start meditating each day and the practices themselves feel pretty good. I know the mental-space-at-other-times part will arrive whenever it gets here, so I’m not trying to rush it.
And I’m actually pretty proud of myself for not stressing about the ‘failed’ part of this experiment.
There was a time when I would have had to scrap the whole thing, convinced that I was missing some key piece of information and hence doing the whole thing wrong.
That instinct still pops up for me from time to time but it rarely details me any more. Apparently, the work I have done on that sort of stuff is really paying off. 😉
(This is a little stream-of-consciousness because I’m not really finished thinking this through. Please bear with me.)
So, I’ve been carrying around some ambient stress again.
I’m not feeling stressed about anything in particular. There’s no overwhelmingly stressful thing going on.
In fact, my *brain* doesn’t feel stressed at all.
My body, however, is telling me otherwise.
My first response to recognizing that stressed out feeling was ‘I need to meditate.’
And meditation does help me release that feeling in the moment, which is great, but reactive meditation is not nearly as helpful as regular (preventative) meditation would be.
See, I know that when I meditate regularly, I get a little more space in my brain.
And that space helps me make better choices about how to spend my time and my energy.
Last fall, I had a month or so when I meditated daily and I really found it beneficial. But then something came up, I couldn’t meditate at my regular time and I got off track. I’ve had a few short streaks of practice since then but it hasn’t really stuck.
However, once again, I am determined to find my way back to that daily practice.
On Monday, I was trying to figure out a good time for my practice when I (once again?) made the connection that meditation is similar in one way to my ADHD medication – it gives me a little space between my thought and my action so I can choose to be more effective, to be kinder to myself.
So then I thought ‘What if I put meditation in the same category as my meds?’ – that is, something that needs to happen daily, at the same time, in order to have the best effect.
And then I considered whether I could meditate right after I medicate.
I went back and forth on that for a few minutes because mornings can be a tricky time to find quiet minutes to myself but maybe I can take my meditation and my medications at the same time and it will work out just fine.
I’m going to give it a week and see how it goes.
I’ll report back next Tuesday with the results of this utterly unscientific experiment.
I’ll even take notes.
What does this have to do with meditation? Absolutely nothing. But it does make me feel calm so that’s kind of tangentially connected, right? image description: Khalee, my light-haired dog, is curled up in a red leather armchair next to a white pillow with gold stars on it. In the background, there is a patch of sunlight on the wall, a tower fan, and the rear wheel of a bicycle.
I have been feeling a little frustrated with my six week fitness plan.
The first two weeks of 10 minutes a day was great and I was enjoying the second two weeks even though it was harder to fit in 20 minutes per day.
And then the side of my knee started hurting.
And then I got a cold.
And then I had a migraine.
And then my back got cranky with me.
Basically, things went awry as things tend to do.
And my two weeks of 20 minutes is going to be three or three and a half weeks of 20 minutes with some days off here and there.
It was annoying.
I wasn’t being hard on myself. I knew taking the days off was the right thing to do and I didn’t think poorly of myself because of it.
But I was ANNOYED.
And FRUSTRATED.
I wanted to stick with my plan. I wanted to be able to keep going. I wanted to stay on schedule.
I wanted it to be straightforward.
I had been doing so well adapting the exercises and being kind to myself and working really hard during each session.
And I was afraid I was going to get frustrated enough to lose momentum.
Then, this past weekend, Facebook offered up some advice from my 2016 self that helped me shake off both the annoyance and the frustration and tell myself a better story.
Here’s what past me wrote in a type of post I used to do before my Hey Team! advice:
Your challenge today is to take the easy way.
That sounds like bad advice, I know, but I find that I often take the hard way without thinking about it and I end up working way harder than I need to in order to reach the same place.
See the pics below? That’s the hill behind my kid’s school. I was all set to walk up that steeper, slippery slope when I realized that…
Image description: a photo of a steep snow/ice covered hill with a few muddy/grassy patches. There are bare trees at the top and a building can be seen in the distance. It’s a sunny day with a cloudy blue sky.
ten feet to my left there was a much more gradual slope that would be much easier to walk up.
Image description: a photo of a gradually sloping snow/ice covered hill one route is much steeper than the other. There are evergreen trees and a cloudy blue sky at the top. Some red and blue poles from playground equipment are at the top left.
I still got where I was going, but the trip was much more pleasant.
Sure, taking a challenging route is good sometimes, if the challenge is the point but sometimes, you just need to be at the top of the hill.
So, take a look at the point of what you are doing today. Are you looking for a challenge, looking to test yourself, or is the point to get to the top of the hill so you can move on?
If you just need to get up there, then you have my official permission as a life coach, as someone’s Mom and as a kindness ambassador to just stroll up the easy way.
Or, to put it in storytelling terms, is this the story of how you climbed a hill and persevered or is the story about what came next? Choose your path accordingly.
May your easy path be clear today. 💚
And then that’s when I realized that this is NOT the story of how I did these specific workouts in this specific time frame.
This is the story of how I can feel better and be more focused by getting more exercise.
It’s the story of how I can be stronger.
It’s the story of how I can build and maintain sustainable fitness habits.
You may not have realized it but Thursday, March 30 was a big day.
What was so big about it?
It was the first day since last Fall that I could wear sneakers on my daily walk with Khalee.
Photo evidence! Well, evidence is a strong work, it probably wouldn’t hold up in a court of law. It’s just a photo of my sneakers feet on the pavement, it doesn’t prove that I haven’t worn my sneakers on a walk in months but please cut me some slack here, Your Honour. Image description: a top down photo of my pink sneakers and black leggings as I stand on the salt-speckled asphalt street. The sun is behind me to the right so legs are caring a shadow toward the upper left of the image. The angle of the sun is creating one big shadow out of both of legs so, shadow-wise, it looks like I was hopping on my one giant leg.
And it was one of the first days I could just wear regular pants on my walk instead of adding an extra layer.
It still isn’t *warm* here, only a few degrees below zero but those few degrees make a huge difference for me.
Being able to just throw on a jacket (hat and gloves, too, of course) and put on my sneakers feels way smoother and quicker than adding another pair of pants and lacing up my boots.
It reduces the friction for getting out through the door, it feels like I could drop everything and head out at any time.
(I can always do that, of course, but now it actually *feels* that way, too.)
It just feels EASIER to get out there.
And Khalee is much less impatient with me in the porch. She simply cannot believe how long it takes me to get ready sometimes. (Humans are very weird, apparently.)
Speaking of me being weird, Khalee also can’t believe that I would waste valuable snow-sniffing time by stopping to take her picture. Image description: a n outdoor photo of Khalee, a light-haired, medium-sized dog, is on a neon yellow leash and black/aqua harness. She is standing on the side of the road with snowbanks to her right and she is looking back toward the camera. My shadow, the shadow of the leash and the dog-walking paraphernalia can be seen on the left side of the photo.
So, it’s still cold.
We still have lots of snow.
This isn’t my house in the background and not every lawn has this much snow right now but still, there’s a lot of snow around. Image description: a smirky selfie with a snowbank so high that only the peaked roof of the house is visible behind the snow. I am wearing a green winter hat, my oversized cats-eye glasses, and a green coat. My light brown hair is sticking out from under my hat to rest on my shoulder.
But I am feeling Springish because the sun has been out a lot lately and I can wear my sneakers on my walks.
Sure, it’s not green grass, crocuses, and birdsong but life is easier when I adjust my expectations to my reality, right?
Soon, soon, Khalee and I will be able to sit on these front steps enjoying a cup of tea…ok, I’ll be the only one with tea but we’ll both be out there. Image description: a selfie of me and Khalee on my front steps with part of my house and my door in the background. The sun is shining on us and I’m squinting and smiling as she sniffs my face.
You may not have realized it but Thursday, March 30 was a big day.
What was so big about it?
It was the first day since last Fall that I could wear sneakers on my daily walk with Khalee.
Photo evidence! Well, evidence is a strong work, it probably wouldn’t hold up in a court of law. It’s just a photo of my sneakers feet on the pavement, it doesn’t prove that I haven’t worn my sneakers on a walk in months but please cut me some slack here, Your Honour. Image description: a top down photo of my pink sneakers and black leggings as I stand on the salt-speckled asphalt street. The sun is behind me to the right so legs are caring a shadow toward the upper left of the image. The angle of the sun is creating one big shadow out of both of legs so, shadow-wise, it looks like I was hopping on my one giant leg.
And it was one of the first days I could just wear regular pants on my walk instead of adding an extra layer.
It still isn’t *warm* here, only a few degrees below zero but those few degrees make a huge difference for me.
Being able to just throw on a jacket (hat and gloves, too, of course) and put on my sneakers feels way smoother and quicker than adding another pair of pants and lacing up my boots.
It reduces the friction for getting out through the door, it feels like I could drop everything and head out at any time.
(I can always do that, of course, but now it actually *feels* that way, too.)
It just feels EASIER to get out there.
And Khalee is much less impatient with me in the porch. She simply cannot believe how long it takes me to get ready sometimes. (Humans are very weird, apparently.)
Speaking of me being weird, Khalee also can’t believe that I would waste valuable snow-sniffing time by stopping to take her picture. Image description: a n outdoor photo of Khalee, a light-haired, medium-sized dog, is on a neon yellow leash and black/aqua harness. She is standing on the side of the road with snowbanks to her right and she is looking back toward the camera. My shadow, the shadow of the leash and the dog-walking paraphernalia can be seen on the left side of the photo.
So, it’s still cold.
We still have lots of snow.
This isn’t my house in the background and not every lawn has this much snow right now but still, there’s a lot of snow around. Image description: a smirky selfie with a snowbank so high that only the peaked roof of the house is visible behind the snow. I am wearing a green winter hat, my oversized cats-eye glasses, and a green coat. My light brown hair is sticking out from under my hat to rest on my shoulder.
But I am feeling Springish because the sun has been out a lot lately and I can wear my sneakers on my walks.
Sure, it’s not green grass, crocuses, and birdsong but life is easier when I adjust my expectations to my reality, right?
Soon, soon, Khalee and I will be able to sit on these front steps enjoying a cup of tea…ok, I’ll be the only one with tea but we’ll both be out there. Image description: a selfie of me and Khalee on my front steps with part of my house and my door in the background. The sun is shining on us and I’m squinting and smiling as she sniffs my face.
