When I was a kid, I sometimes watched and followed along with Kareen’s Yoga. This long-running 1970s show, out of British Colombia, was hosted by German-Canadian yogi Karen Zebroff. I think I even owned a copy of one of her books.
Kareen Zebroff as I remember her, from her website.
Occasionally I think of those early experiments with yoga and give it another whirl. I have tried Yoga with Adrienne but it never stuck as a habit.
I experimented with chair yoga during the depths of the pandemic work-from-home period. I checked out Yoga with Kassandra on Youtube with hometown Ottawa yogi Kassandra Reinhardt. I connected most with Paula Lay (yoginimelbourne) and did many of her short videos focusing on spots that hurt or to help me sleep.
I’m currently on a break from ballet, swimming more frequently, and I have been working hard to change how I engage certain muscles thanks to my awesome physiotherapist. The downside is that I am feeling more tight than usual. So, once again, I am poking into doing yoga.
It’s all a bit random, to be honest. I’ll do nothing for days, then suddenly get the urge to do an hour’s worth of videos focused on hip mobility. Or do a couple of shoulder/neck stretches while standing in my kitchen waiting for something to heat up.
I would love to figure out a way to become more consistent (that doesn’t involve changing into yoga gear first thing in the morning, or going to a studio). Maybe I just need to acknowledge that my yoga practice will always be random, but I will keep coming back, just as I have always done.
Happy Baby, possibly my favourite yoga pose. Photo found at Mamduka.com.
A couple of months ago I moved back to Toronto after 33 years in London, Ontario. I last lived in Toronto when I was a Master’s student at U of T from 1987-88. Both I and the city have changed a lot since then. So I had nothing familiar as far as working goes to tap into when I got here in May. Not only that, but my routines had fallen to the side completely over the winter as I prepped for my move. And finally, it’s been a stinking hot summer, not a great time to get back into running.
So when a friend suggested that we try out the Y, which turns out to be just a 12-minute walk from where I live, it sounded like the perfect solution for so many reasons. Most notably, if we were going to join a gym, we wanted it to be a relaxed place with a truly inclusive vibe. The Y definitely ticks that box. It’s also convenient, has great equipment, lots of programming, and a 25m pool. We joined, and here’s what I’ve tried so far:
Aquafit — you can do this 45-minute class in shallow or deep water. So far, I’ve only signed up for shallow. I had a bit of a misconception about aquafit, I have to admit. I thought it would be easy and not feel like much of a workout. It turns out to be a good workout, very much more exerting than I anticipated, especially the part where you use the water dumbbells to create resistance. I’ve been using the blue ones, which are apparently easier than the yellow. I can’t imagine feeling ready for the yellow. But then that is the wonderful thing about resistance training — it makes you stronger.
MuscleFit — another 45-minute class, this time in the gym. Each participant gathers a mixture of light-medium and medium-heavy barbells and dumbbells for a guided full body workout. Again it’s a tough one, where the muscle fatigue is from high reps rather than heavy weights (even the “heavy” weights aren’t especially heavy). The first time I did it I overdid the barbell weights and had to lighten my load. I did better the second time, and have also learned over time that it’s okay to set the weights down and do body weight or take a break if needed. Will I keep doing that? Maybe on occasion but I also want to reintroduce resistance training on my own. The Y has lots of equipment in multiple different rooms and studios. So even when it’s busy it looks as if no one has to fight too hard to get the weights they need, and I remember enjoying the community atmosphere in the weight room.
Yoga — I haven’t found a hot yoga studio yet and will likely wait until the fall to do that, given the heat this summer. But I wanted to get back into a yoga class and it turns out that the Y has those too. I’ve gone a couple of times and had a good experience. Not the most challenging yoga or the most careful instruction, but it’s in a pleasant studio with loads of space, and as with anything, if you know what you’re doing you can make yoga as challenging or as unchallenging as you wish.
Lane swimming — I couldn’t be around a 25m pool for too many days without feeling tempted to get back to lane swimming. I did that this week for the first time, gathering up my gear from back in the day with the intention of doing 40 x 25m in 30 minutes. That would be a pretty slow pace and I didn’t quite make it. I started off with 10 x 25m of breast stroke, which took me to 10 minutes, then cut back from 20 to 15 x 25m freestyle, following by another 10 of breast stroke. It was a lot tougher than I expected it to be but now I have a benchmark and a goal. The goal is to get back to 40 x 25m by the end of the summer. I have no idea if that is realistic. I want to add drills and workouts to my lane swimming at some point. I remember enjoying that kind of training. Being in the pool again feels incredibly good.
As far as running goes, I’ve been out a few times and have reconnected with the “getting started” series of the Nike Run Club again. It’s been a sticky hot summer and I miss my running crew and my familiar routes. But if I can get back to 3x a week, I’ll be pleased with that.
Living in a large urban centre again means a lot more walking in my day to day than before. The traffic here is horrendous at unpredictable times, and if at all possible you want to avoid paying for parking. So much is easily accessible to me on foot, and though people complain about the transit, I adore the subway and live conveniently close to a few stations.
So that’s my report on establishing some fitness routines in a new city. As with anything, it can feel daunting at first. And the loss of community (in my case my running group and the hot yoga studio I frequented) is no small thing. But now that I’ve reconnected with the Y, it’s been an enjoyable experience that’s put me in touch with new and familiar activities in a relaxed atmosphere that offers a sense of community and belonging that I really like.
Image description: Overhead shot of gym stuff lined up on a towel: shower shoes, swim cap, goggles, swim suit, and running shoes. Photo by Tracy I
💙 Every class the teacher reminds us, because there might be new people in the class, that the silk hammocks can hold up to 1000 lbs. As a person with a larger body, I find that very reassuring. 😊
💚 The class is very easy on your knees and other joints because the hammock bears your body weight. “While it may seem gimmicky to some, AntiGravity Yoga provides a therapeutic and effective way for the hips and spine to stretch that isn’t achievable in a regular yoga practice. The premise of the AntiGravity technique is that the spine is “compressed” when doing everyday activities, and the hammocks cause zero compression in the joints, allowing the spine to move freely. ” (from We tried it: AntiGravity restorative yoga, Canadian Living)
💜 It’s both serious and playful. This particular instructor takes safety seriously and stresses that everyone’s finds their own pace. “In this class we strive for progress, not perfection.” But she also shows the class how to get into the hammock belly down, push off, and breaststroke to the front of the room. Fun.
❤️The hammocks are very pretty. There’s something aesthetically pleasing when the light streams in through the studio windows and catches the parachute-like silk fabric of the hammocks.
💛 Yes, you’re floating in a hammock, suspended from the ceiling, but you are only a couple of inches off the ground. It feels both like you’re flying and that you can reach a foot down and touch the floor.
🧡 My favourite position is Cocoon pose, or cocoon savasana at the end of class. Because of course it is. Zzzzz.
Last week I outlined my plans for April and I thought I made things pretty easy for myself.
And I kind of did.
But, apparently, not quite easy enough.
It turns out that a mindful cup of tea – clear break- in the afternoon is a lovely addition to my day.
My days have felt a bit calmer.
I have gotten to have tea with friends three times, including tea with my sister Denise on her birthday.
I just feel really good about making a point to stop for tea and a rest.
And I’m sure that yoga would have a similar calming effect and would feel great for my body and my brain…
If I could remember to do it.
I mean, technically speaking, I have done yoga daily because I did a few focused stretches and a little time in Savasana (corpse pose) before heading to bed.
But that wasn’t what I had intended to do each evening.
My plan was to do a 10 minute yoga video before bed so a few stretches and some time in Savasana was not the kind of practice I was seeking.
Instead, it’s the kind of practice I end up doing when I realize moments before bed that I don’t have enough energy to do 10 minutes of movement – even gentle, restful movement.
So, since the tea practice is coming to me fairly easily, I will just let that one roll along and I will focus on figuring out how to remember to do that 10 minutes of yoga before I am too tired.
This week, I’ll experiment with setting an alarm for 9pm and see if that makes things easier.
And once I’m done my daily yoga, I’ll probably even have another cup of tea.*
Image description: A photo of the edit-alarm screen on my phone. The background is black and there are settings for the time (9:00 PM), Repeat (daily), Label (Yay for Yoga!), Sound (Constellation), Snooze (option is on),This isn’t from this week, I just like this photo. Image description: a large glass mug decorated with stars is sitting on a wooden table. The mug is partially full of tea (a tea bag is still in the mug and the white tag is hanging over the side) and next to it is a green post-it note that has the word reminder at the top and below it is a drawing of a robot pointing to a sign that reads ‘Everyone needs to recharge!’
*Don’t worry about me drinking tea at 9pm. Mostly it’s ginger-peach tea but even if I have caffeine at that hour it won’t keep me up – this may or may not be related to my ADHD.
🐑 Well, it feels like the world is falling apart. There’s a fascist coup underway in the United States, the country with which we share the world’s longest undefended border. And Trump et al are talking about taking over Canada, either by force or by crushing us economically. We’re all worried about external influence on our upcoming election. So there’s that. I’ve written a bit about the mess we’re in here and here.
🐑 I am currently on research leave from my big job. I spent the first half of the month of March in Dunedin, New Zealand where it’s autumn and still warm-ish. I was a visitor in Philosophy at the University of Otago.
🐑 The second half of March is back in Ontario where it’s spring (but not really yet). Here, I’m a Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Ethics at the University of Toronto.
Centre for EthicsCN tower as seen from Centre for EthicsSam selfie
🐑 The good news is that it’s now light for more than twelve hours a day here.
🦁 I’m at 95 workouts so far in the 2025 workout counting group, on track for 400 workouts this year.
🦁 I’m way way behind on my reading goals. I’m in the middle of about six different books and I can’t seem to finish any of them. But I am reading lots of non-fiction while on my research leave, so there’s that.
🦁 I sensibly dropped my cycling distance goal down from 5000 km a year to 3000. Here’s the plan: “A more reasonable goal for me I think is 50 km a week when I’m in Zwift mode and say 75 km a week in the summer months. Let’s say summer is 12 weeks, so that’s 900 km. The other 40 weeks, I’ll aim for 50 km, and that’s 2000 km. If I add and then round up, it’s 3000 km.”
🦁 I’m walking lots in Toronto, 10 km one day. I woke up the next day and my legs were sore but it wasn’t my knees. That was a good thing. Public transit, esp. streetcars, make me more likely to attempt big walks since I know that at any time I can change my mind and get a ride. One of those walks, the longest, involved a meet up with fellow blogger Nicole. It was so nice to see each other in person. The bloggers don’t often get to do that!
10 km of walkingScenes from Toronto walking
🦁 Swimming! I struggled to get into the pool for lane swimming/stroke improvement because I’m so not good that it’s not much of a fitness activity but this year I found an answer. I go early for aquafit so aquatfit is the workout and my lane swimming is the warm up. Mallory also had some good tips for me, since she both teaches swimming and she’s a very experienced lifeguard.
🦁 Yoga! Sarah and I have been taking hot yin yoga at the fancy gym and I’ve done some anti-gravity restorative yoga. One of the perks of my more flexible research leave schedule is being able to take group fitness classes during the day. Going back to my regular schedule might be hard but I’m also missing my job so I think it’ll balance out.
🦁 So far I’m still riding indoors since we returned to Canada (after lots and lots of outdoor NZ riding) but that will change in April. I plan to bring my Brompton to Toronto.
Today I was planning to post about health information and the changes to our access in the past 13 days (since Donald Trump was inaugurated as President of the United States). And that post is coming– you deserve to be informed and supported by responsible folks writing for all audiences.
But it’s proving disheartening. I’m appalled and sick with worry over the fate of all of those in need of healthcare and all those working in healthcare whose jobs may be cut for no good reason. So I’m taking a breath. But know this, dear readers– we are here to witness and report and encourage and share what we know and what we’re doing. And we’re always happy to hear from you– your concerns, fears, plans, and needs.
So, while I get this post together (the first of many for the next four years), here’s a reblog of a post I wrote about feeling supported on my yoga mat. Yoga, for me, is a comfort and support, whether actively moving, opening up in a yin pose, or in rest during yoga nidra. So take a look. And if you feel like it, let me know what you’re doing today to get some support what we all really need.
Image description: Outside shot of a woman (Christine) with dark medium long hair and wearing a short-sleeved shirt, holding a young boy while he climbs on a rope climber in a playground, with dappled light, a fence, and a tree in the background. She is looking up at the boy and the boy is looking up at the next rung of the rope. Photo credit: Viceth Vong.
“Why aren’t you doing another triathlon this year?” an acquaintance asked.
I gulped. “I’m having some, uh, health issues,” I said. I was keeping things vague out of necessity—I had no damn idea what was happening, only that I had a constant (and I mean 100% of the time) headache that reached an unbearable level by the time I left work for the day. I went to sleep pretty much as soon as I got home—not only because being in pain is exhausting, but because sleep was the only time I didn’t feel awful. My life goals had gone from: publish a book, rock my career in publishing, and finish a tri even though I can barely swim, to: get through the day.
In the year after the pain started, I had test after test. They all came back negative, which was a good thing on the one hand (who wants to have a brain tumor or Lyme disease), and utterly frustrating on the other. After each of my appointments at Boston’s various prestige medical clinics, I wanted to scream, Why can’t you just tell me what was wrong with me?
Eventually, through a process of elimination, they diagnosed me with occipital neuralgia (nerve pain in the upper neck) and idiopathic chronic migraines (idiopathic just means that they have no flipping idea why it’s happening.) I tried treatment after treatment (Botox injections, handfuls of pills, various psychologic therapies) but the headaches wouldn’t budge. I was in bed for the vast majority of most days. The body I toned through hours of training atrophied.
Eventually I went to the Cleveland Clinic for a three-week “headache camp,” as a friend called it. There they tweaked my medications but more importantly, they taught me more than I could’ve imagined about headaches and how to maneuver your lifestyle to live with—and hopefully eventually prevent—them.
One of their prescriptions was to get back to exercising. I had all but stopped as the pain consumed me. There were a few scientifically backed reasons for this recommendation: exercise has been shown to reduce the severity of pain in people with many chronic pain conditions; it also greatly helps with the anxiety and depression that often hits people with chronic illnesses of all stripes (and that certainly hit me).
For me, it also allowed me to get back in touch with that former triathaloning self. I started with walking—an exercise I still love. I added yoga and light weight training. Slowly but surely, I started to feel better physically and emotionally. Now, I walk for an hour a few times a week, do pilates at least once a week, and I’m currently attempting to reintroduce weight training after that fell out of my routine. On days I exercise, I feel less achey—and also like my body is my friend again, not something that revolted against me. I feel, too, that I am strong—I hadn’t realized how upsetting it was to my sense of self to think of myself as weak. Now, I am not just someone with a disabling condition, I am someone who can keep up with her son on the playground, who can squat down and lift his four-year-old body, who doesn’t have to fear the idea of trudging around a theme park all day.
I have greater exercise ambitions, too: I plan to conquer a ten-mile hike in the next few months, and an even longer one by the end of the year, with the eventual goal of walking 100 miles or so on Europe’s El Camino Santiago. I have no thoughts of trying for another triathlon, but thanks in part to regular, light exercise, I’m doing much more than just getting through the day now.
If you have a story about exercising during or after illness, we’d love to hear it!
Christine Junge is a writer living in San Jose, CA. She’s currently working on a novel, and blogs about parenting with a chronic illness/disability at ThanksForNothingBody.substack.com
Do I know how many parts there will be in Planuary? I do not.
I do, however, know that this is Part 1 so I am going to forge ahead from here.
By the way, Planuary extends far beyond my fitness/mindfulness/wellness plans but since this is not the “Christine talks endlessly about her life” blog, I’m going to stick to things related to our focus here at Fit is a Feminist Issue…mostly.
So, since I can’t seem to stop myself from overthinking at the moment, I decided to lean into it and just let my brain wander around until it settled on something that appealed to me as a possible new fitness practice to incorporate into my life this year.
And I settled on pushups.*
I really want to be able to do pushups easily and, more important than that, I want to *know* that I have the upper body strength to do pushups easily.
I don’t have a particular number of pushups in mind because the number doesn’t matter to me – I’m chasing a specific feeling.
This is the feeing I am looking for – it’s not that pushups are necessarily easy for her but she has put in the work and she knows she can do them. Image description – a woman in black exercise clothes lowering herself into a pushup. She is outside on a deck and the sun is shining.
And I think that seeking a specific feeling will be far more useful to me than trying to reach a certain number because seeking a sensation feels more like a meaningful practice than trying to reach an arbitrary target.
Of course, once I got that settled in my mind, I went into overthinking mode again. This time I churned up a bunch of thoughts about overdoing things, about how my shoulders and neck might not appreciate my pushup goal, and about how anxious I feel when my neck muscles are tight and and and…well, you all know how overthinking goes, right?
And that’s when I overthought my way into a possible solution (yes, this *does* seem to be a dangerous precedent, indeed.)
I’m going to pair my pushup work with some yoga for my upper body.
I know, not a groundbreaking solution, but hear me out.
I have trouble convincing my ADHD brain not to rush through stretching so even if I had great intentions of stretching after each pushup practice, I would soon be strolling along a road paved with those intentions and heading for a hell of my own making.**
BUT
I can definitely convince myself to do a 10 minute yoga sequence for my upper body every day for a month. My brain loves a month long challenge!
This seems like a helpful sort of twist, doesn’t it? Image description: a woman, seated on a yoga mat outside, is doing an upper body twist so her lower body is facing the camera but her upper body is twisted away. Her right hand is on her left knee and her upper torso and head are facing to the left.
So, when I put those two things together – a plan to get used to pushups over time and a plan to choose an enjoyable yoga practice that will ease tension in my upper body – I may just be on to something.
Now, I’m moving on to Part 1(b) – choosing and practicing an upper body yoga sequence that I enjoy and then adding Part 1 (c) – choosing and following a pushup plan that seems doable.
Further updates as Planuary warrants.
*Yes, I have tried a pushup goal before and, no, it didn’t stick at the time but I know more now than I did then so it’s worth giving it a try.
**Is a hell of your own making the worst kind of hell? There is a case to be made here but I think the philosophers on the Fit is a Feminist Issue team are better equipped to discuss that than I am.
Here we are at December 15th almost halfway through the month and I think this is a good time to take a breather.
Yes, I know that you probably can’t just take today off and rest completely but I am hoping that you can keep an eye out for possibilities for more rest and then take them when they arise.
So, with the idea of giving your brain a break – something I am hoping to carry forward beyond today – I have been thinking about what I can dial back on.
Now, to be clear, while I am someone who always has a lot on the go, I am not someone who goes in for elaborate celebrations or over-the-top events.
I am, however, someone with ADHD who can’t always accurately calculate the time/energy/effort that will be required to do the things I have set out to do and, as a result, I can get overwhelmed with even the fun or interesting things I had hoped to do.
So, dialing back often becomes a VERY important process for me* and it may be useful for you, too.
If you are finding that the thoughts of the weeks ahead are exhausting you already, perhaps there are places where you can dial things back so you have more energy for the things that are really important to you.
For me, dialing back often involves identifying the most minimal version of the task that will still count as done.
So if, for example, I was planning a dinner for my friends and I had envisioned cooking something elaborate, my dialed-back version might involve ordering food, cooking something in the slow cooker, or changing the gathering to a games night instead. I would still get the fun of hanging out with my friends but I could take away the parts that feels overwhelming.
Or if I had a report due and I had planned on designing a cover and doing some more elaborate formatting, a dialed-back version might mean a black and white digital version. (Or I might ask someone else to design the cover and do the formatting.**)
If decorating felt too overwhelming, I might just pick a few key items to put up around the house and leave the rest for another year. If you make the decision to only put up a few things then you close the loop on decorating and it doesn’t hang over you as a task undone.
Dialing back on these things is not about depriving yourself, it’s about giving yourself more space and more energy to do the things that are actually important to you right now.
Dialing back is choosing which things are fine to stay small so you will have room to go big in other areas.
Not everything needs to go up to 11 – some things will serve you perfectly well at level 5, 3, 1, or even 0.
And even though there are often other people involved in these things, I often find that my overwhelm has arisen internally, that I am the one who has the vision that is too big for the time available. So, for me, the key is usually in taking the time to notice the dials on my tasks and then turning them in a direction that suits me best.
If you find that the same thing happens with your dials, I hope that you can adjust them as needed.
And as you figure these things out today (or whenever!), I wish you ease and as much peace of mind as you can muster.
And with rest and ‘dialing back’ in mind, here are our suggested practices for today. Please remember that you are the boss of you and that I am hoping you will do what serves you best, whether it involves these videos or something else entirely.
Please be kind to yourselves, Space Makers!
For our movement practice today, here’s Restful Movement (Theme: Community) from Queer Yoga North:
Still image description: a brightly-coloured title card featuring graphics of a rainbow, a series of hearts in rainbow colours, various brightly-coloured polygons, and a drawing of a white cat in a rainbow bow tie. The title of the video is in a handwritten font on the right side and the background of the image is a vibrant green.
Still image description: a photo in the forest with the trunks of giant trees all around with big spaces in between them, most of the trees are too tall to see their branches and the scene is very light for a forest floor so the top branches must have space between them as well. . Some trees appear to be redwoods but others seem to be evergreens with mossy trunks. There are rocks, fallen logs, and fallen needles on the forest floor.
*Yes, I also work on trying to understand the scale and scope of my tasks but sometimes I don’t realize that I haven’t done that until it is far too late.
** If your budget allows, consider this your permission to hire someone to do some aspects of your tasks for you – even household tasks. Lots of people need extra money this time of year and I have often hired a friend to help with tasks I was dreading or that I couldn’t get around to. I have also traded annoying tasks with friends so, for example, I could make their phone calls while they ran my errands.
It’s December 1st and we’re back with the another edition of Making Space, a series of (mostly) short posts designed to encourage you to make a little space for yourself this month.
No matter what you celebrate (or don’t celebrate!), December is one of those months of ambient stress and busy-ness. There are so many posts and articles full of lists and ideas about how to do more, more, more, and so much discussion of finishing things before the end of the year, or getting ‘the most’ out of the rest of 2024, that it is enough to make your head spin.
Now, I am NOT pretending that you aren’t busy.
And I am not going to be doing any vaguely condescending posts about how if you *just* change your attitude then all the hecticness will just melt away.
Instead, I am going to acknowledge that we all have a lot going on at this point in the year AND I am going to invite you to make a little space for yourself in your days.
Each day, I will post a short exercise/physical activity video and a short meditation/mindfulness video that you can do if you WANT to.
If the videos I post don’t appeal to you, I hope that you will still create some space for yourself and pick something *YOU* like to do.
(Taking a nap, texting a friend, drinking a very slow cup of tea, lying on the floor staring at the ceiling – those all count as making space.)
Giving yourself that space is worthwhile and important, even if you have to ditch something else from your to do list.
So, with all of that said, let’s start on the right foot (ha!) with this short video ‘Foot Stretch for Healthy Feet‘ from Yoga with Bird.
A YouTube video of foot yoga – the still image shows a woman sitting on a yoga mat with her legs crossed and she is massaging her left foot with both hands.
And here’s 1 minute of drawing meditation/mindfulness from Tamara Michael. If you don’t have a pen and paper handy, you could draw with your finger or just breath in and out along with her drawing.
A YouTube video of a drawing meditation that shows a person’s hands drawing lines and dots on a white coil-bound sketchpad. They draw a squiggly line downward for breathing in and a series of dots next to that line for breathing out.
I hope you are able to make the space you need in your day.
