You are the people who don’t take advantage of your glide in breast stroke. Who walk in the lane rather than swimming. Who do some sort of head’s down dog-paddle. Or who do very short strokes and over-cross your arms in freestyle. Or who don’t follow every movement in aqua fit class. Or take it easy instead of pushing yourself throughout.
But you show up every single session and do your workout, whatever it may be. Already I recognize and expect to see you when I’m lifeguarding.
If I were you, I would welcome coaching or lessons because improving my strokes and speed are constant goals. But you seem happy to be moving through the water, and that’s the important thing.
You demonstrate discipline I don’t have, just by showing up every day.
Older women smiling and laughing during a water aerobics class. Photo from oldldadygains.com
I started this post in my head while I drew our gold star and I started with a very different idea…
But once I finished our star, I realized that she looks so celebratory that I wanted to look for extra reasons for her to feel that way.
So, my friends, I’m hoping you will help her out by looking for things to celebrate in your life right now.
I’m not asking you to pretend that your frustrations and challenges or even your anger don’t exist.
I’m asking you to give yourself a moment, a breather, a chance to focus on something that is going right, even if it is a tiny thing.
Because I feel that taking a few minutes to focus on something good, something celebratory, can help fuel your resolve for dealing with everything else.
And because it feels good to look on the bright side when you can, even if it is just briefly.
So maybe your meditation felt good this morning – celebrate!
Maybe you can lift with just a little more ease – celebrate!
Maybe your friend can join you on your walk today – celebrate!
Maybe that ache in your heel has lessened a bit- celebrate!
Maybe your new dance steps were a little less confusing than they were last time – celebrate!
Or, maybe, like me, you are finding it easier to get back into the rhythm of taekwondo than you thought you would – a definite cause for celebration for me!
I dare you, I welcome you, I invite you to take just a glimpse toward what is going right and give it a grin and a happy nod.
Go You!
Go Team!
Here, of course, is your gold star for your efforts!
Image description: a cartoonish gold star drawn on a white square. The gold star has a happy expression and is trimmed in light green with a black outline. The background of the image is covered in tiny green dots and the paper is framed in green with black trim.
Sam invited me years ago to guest blog on FIFI, and back then as someone in her late 30s I’d wondered how my musings would fit as a not-quite-yet “midlife” feminist. Aside from her forward thinking (as of course we all grow into middle age), while planning for holiday travel recently I’d realized that perhaps I had finally made it to mid-life. Why? Because I was, for the first time, packing two of things.
I like to exercise to music, but what if my lightning charge cable breaks? Solution: Bring two. What if the busted sneakers I usually bring don’t have treads for the hike I want to do? Answer: Bring a second pair. What if the luggage with my swimming towel doesn’t arrive? Remedy: pack my microfibre travel towel (when I know towels will be available). What if I run out of face 60 SPF while I’m out in the sun. Yes: Pack a second bottle.
A few years ago I blogged about treetop adventures and my reflections on realizations about value of preventative injury measures and safety thinking. Admittedly, for most of my life I have never had a “safety first” attitude (sorry mom). Due to youth, inexperience, and limited financial means I’ve usually winged it with what I had, or I just went without.
These days, in contrast, I’ve noticed my brain has been thinking ahead: planning back ups and paying more attention to minimizing risk. Is it because I can financially afford doubles of stuff, I’ve become wiser in my older age, or I’ve eventually learned from my mistakes?
It’s probably a combination. It’s pretty neat, this sudden impulse to be more prepared, because I know as I grow older I know I can less afford to be injured, and the added preparation measures give me more piece of mind (even with slightly heavier luggage).
My goal is not to reinforce stereotype about middle age. I can see how these “solutions” tend towards comfort, even excess. And I am sure there are plenty of free spirits who are reading this and, out of necessity or confidence, connect with very little of it. I celebrate you!
But today, I recognize it’s a privilege to be able to bring two of what I might (or might not) need for my holiday fitness activities, and I am appreciating that, for probably the first time, I am caring for myself in this new way.
So, as I move steadily into the middle of my midlife, I find myself twice grateful for such abundance. 💜
We’re about halfway through the first month of the new year so you’ve been working towards your plans for about two weeks now.
And you’re doing great!
How do I know that?
Because you have been putting effort in, one way or another for two weeks and that is definitely moving you in the direction you want to go.
But when we’re focused on the path ahead, we tend to just keep track of how far we still need to go and forget about the distance we have already travelled.
So, this might be a good time to take a glance backwards and see how far you have come.
Maybe it’s just a little easier to get started on your practice than it was at first.
Maybe your arms are just a little stronger or your shoulder is slightly less likely to give you grief when you lift something.
Or you might find the stairs a little easier or it’s not quite as hard to swing your legs out of bed.
Perhaps your meditation practice is a little easier to slip into or you didn’t immediately feel overwhelmed and stressed when you got an email from that client.
Maybe that one stretch is no longer the worst part of your workout or maybe you have slept better a few times or maybe you enjoyed your walk a little more recently.
Those are all markers of the distance you have travelled so far* and they are worth celebrating.
I like to get my coaching clients to do a disproportionate celebration for their early milestones because these early steps to introduce something new into your life can be some of the most challenging parts of habit building.
Please feel free to do the same for your celebration – watch a movie with a friend to celebrate the fact that your ankle is less cranky, make your favourite meal to celebrate that your neck turns a little easier now, spend an hour reading in the tub to celebrate that your mindfulness practice felt a bit more doable this week.
This is your life and these are the things you want to add to it, there is nothing wrong with celebrating every success. Everything you do to make this habit feel like a positive addition is another way of encouraging yourself to continue when things get challenging.
Ok, I know the question in some readers’ minds right now:
What about if you haven’t been able to get started yet?
Well, I think you should find a way to be kind to yourself about it AND is still a good time to glance back and find something to celebrate.
Maybe you have given things some thought and/or tried some things that you decided not to continue with – celebrate the fact that you have figured out some things you don’t want to do.
Having that information means you are moving toward finding out what you actually want – your experiment has been successfully in eliminating some possibilities.
Or maybe you have some things that you want to do but you haven’t been able to get to them yet. Glancing back lets you see what your obstacles were/are – noticing the obstacles is the first step to figuring out a way around them. So, celebrate the fact that you are definitely on the path toward your goals. **
Or perhaps you haven’t started because the beginning of the year was too hectic for you and you are just now coming up for air.
First off, celebrate the fact that you kept putting one foot in front of the other through that hectic time. Go you!
And then, remember that starting things on January 1 is a tradition, not a rule. Some people like that ‘brand new year’ feeling (and maybe you are one of them) but you can start something new at any time.
January 15, 2024 to January 15, 2025 is exactly the same amount of time as January 1, 2024 to January 1, 2025. So you can start your plans whenever it makes sense for you to start.
And you can celebrate being a rebel you carved out their own timeframe for their goals. 😉
Finally, if you haven’t gotten started yet, you can also decide NOT to start. If your fitness and wellness routines feel good, you don’t have to take on any extra challenges if you don’t want to. You can let go of the idea that you should (blech – I still hate that word) be changing things and carry on with the things that already serve you well.
And that decision is definitely something to celebrate.
So, Team, no matter where you are in your plans, I hope you can take a few moments and celebrate your efforts, no matter what they are.
I hope you can glance back and find something that makes you say, “So far, so good!”
Be kind to yourself out there!
Here’s the gold star I drew to celebrate your efforts:
A photo of a drawing of a metallic gold star at the centre of a series of triangles that were formed by drawing black lines from the star to the edge of the paper. Each triangle is coloured a shade of blue or purple. The overall effect is a bit like stained glass.
*And, if you are so inclined, they are probably worth writing down somewhere so you can compare notes with today’s self the next time you glance back at your progress.
**I’ll be writing more about obstacles tomorrow – see you then!
Last weekend I was at a party for the people who board their horses at a local barn. We started talking with the owner about its evolution as she is now almost 80, and I realized it is 20 years since I first started riding.
At the time, it was a school barn and I had a horse-mad six year old daughter, so she started taking lessons some time in the fall of 2014. I sat in the unheated barn in layers of winter gear plus the horse’s blanket, trying to stay warm. Some time around Christmas or early January, I decided it had to be warmer on a horse, so I signed up for lessons too.
I do not come from a horse family – at all. My mom, who grew up with horses as work animals on her prairie farm (and who fought with her brothers about who got to ride a bike to school and who was stuck riding a horse), thinks we are crazy.
She’s not entirely wrong, as horses are definitely a financial investment. But they can also bring some pretty cool benefits. For my daughter, it was better mental health because it got her out of the ballet studio and into fresh air and sunshine. It was also a great confidence builder for a tiny child who struggled at school to be able to get a 2,000 pound animal to do what she wanted. Reading everything she could about horse breeds and horse care turned her into a reader.
For me, it was an activity I could share with my daughter, but also a way to get brave while doing a sport. I never loved it, but I learned to jump. When I fell off my horse the first time and suffered a concussion, I got back on a few weeks later, instead of quitting the sport. When I fell off the second time (going over a jump), I had time to think about landing so I wasn’t injured and got right back on and did the jump again – successfully. I have since learned how to stay on during noisy rainstorms when my horse gets scared, and when to get off because I don’t feel confident.
This June will be the 10th anniversary of buying our first horse, Fancy. These days, I rarely ride as Fancy is getting older and suffers from some arthritis, so it is uncomfortable for her to have my weight on her back. Instead, a teenager and my daughter share the riding duties while I mostly just go out for visits to feed and groom her. I have not yet been given permission to try riding Karma, the younger horse my daughter bought two years ago.
Fancy, a very dark brown mare wearing her winter blanket and sprinkled with a bit of snow last weekend. She loves being outdoors year-round, as long as she is bundled up, has her shelter, her friends, and a steady supply of hay and water.
Karma, a dark brown horse with a heart-shaped blaze, photobombs Fancy, who is standing in a green field with dark brown horses on either side.
I have trouble planning in December so I usually call January Planuary and do my planning at that point.
For 2024, I am using some lessons from last year and just using Planuary to identify some really general goals/ways I want to feel and then I will take things month by month from there.
What does this photo have to do with my post? Not much…unless you consider that I am trying to use ‘things I like’ as a guideline for my plans and I really like how this bulb looks with the dusting of snow on top so I followed through on my plan to use it. 😉 image description: a red decorative bulb hangs in the leafless branches of a lilac tree in my front yard. There is a light dusting of snow on the lawn, on the branches of the tree and on the bulb.
The long version of the post goes like this:
Some combination of ADHD, personality, and December busy-ness has always made it tricky for me to create any plans that are supposed to start on January 1.
In fact, in December, I am usually scrambling to finish things up and January is just a hazy time in the distant future.
For the longest time, I was really hard on myself about not having January plans in place when a given year started. Gradually, though, I learned to accept the way my Decembers usually play out and use January for my planning instead.
In fact, I even renamed January to Planuary so I made it clear to myself that I wasn’t behind or making a mess of things. Instead, I was choosing to plan in the first part of the year.
That February approach helped remind me how I do much better when I work in a relatively limited time frame and when I strike a good balance between structure and flexibility.
Deciding to finish 2023 soft gave me lots of time to think about how I might want to approach 2024 and I decided that I wanted to continue soft.
Part of that plan involves using Planuary a little differently than I used to.
I’m not making long-term specific plans for this year.
I’m not even going to try.
Instead, I’m using Planuary to identify how I generally want to feel – physically and mentally – overall during this year.
Once I have that figured out (and once I’ve done a little journaling about it) I’ll decide on some actions that will help me to amble in the direction of that feeling over the course of the month.
At the end of Planuary, I’ll see if I am closer to how I want to feel and that information will help me determine the details of my February activities.
This feels like a soft way for me to continue – no pressure but a bit of direction and a loose kind of structure.
And it feels doable and hopeful, two things that are always important to me but especially so at the moment.
Do you already have your plans in place for this year? Or are you doing a Planuary-type thing?
If you have plans are they detailed or are they fairly loose?
Are you keeping things soft like me or do you like a bit more intensity in your day-to-day?
Just so you know, this plan meets with Khalee’s approval. Image description: a photo of Khalee, my light-haired, medium-sized dog, lying on some blankets on my bed. She is lying on her stomach with her snout extended toward the camera and she looks adorable.
I hope that you are feeling a little wiggle room in your day and/or you can give yourself a little wiggle room later.
This may be a good time to revamp your list of tasks and activities that you have planned for the next while and see if anything can be shifted, changed, discarded, or resized.
It may also be a good time to check if you have included enough fun or soothing or restful activities over the days ahead.
And, yes, I know it can be tricky to undertake both of those processes but even a five minute look at your list might be enough to make a difference.
Personally, I always find that deciding NOT to do something from the ‘if I have time’ part of my list or doing anything that closes an open loop creates a lot of mental space.I hope you can have the same result.
So, on to our videos for today!
I just loved the friendly energy from the instructor, Panida Klintong, in this Energy Boost Routine from Brain Education TV and I hope you will, too.
Still image features the instructor in comfy clothing standing on an orange mat in an exercise studio, reaching their right arm overhead and leaning slightly to the left. They look happy and engaged. On the right side of the image is the title of the video 10 Minute Routine Energy Boost in white text.
If your brain feels a bit too crowded to try the process I suggest above, perhaps this 5 minute Declutter Your Mind Meditation from Mindly will help.
Still image is a cartoon drawing of a person with long hair wearing clothes in soothing shades of sitting cross-legged on grass. There are small plants in the far corners on either side, hills in shades of white and beige in the background, and the sky is a pale peach colour. The overall effect is restful.
About Making Space 2023: In December 2020, Fit is a Feminist Issue blogger Martha created a tradition – a series of reminder posts to take good care of ourselves during this last month of the year when it is far too easy to get swept up in your to do list, no matter what you are celebrating or not celebrating.
In 2021, I started doing daily December reminders with a post called Give Yourself Some Space, and that’s how the ‘Making Space‘ December tradition began. Throughout December 2021 and 2022, I wrote a short post that included two videos – one for exercise and one for meditation – and a bit of encouragement for you to make space for yourself at this busy time of year.
These posts are not about cramming more things into your month, they reminding you that there IS a *YOU* who is doing all of the things and that you are worth taking good care of.
Perhaps the things I suggest aren’t what you need at the moment. That’s totally ok. Perhaps you can use something else to create some space, something that will help you feel more relaxed or more in charge of your day. Just do whatever you can to give yourself a little more breathing room.
So, some of these posts may be long and some may be short but please know that every single one of them is written with the hope that you can find a little ease in your day, whatever that looks like for you.
I really need an extra soft day about now and I hope you’ll join me in going extra easy today.
Let’s start by making space for this 5 Minute Gentle Couch Yoga Stretch from Santosha Spirit.
Still image shows the instructor in comfy clothes seated on a couch with one hand on their heart and one hand on their belly.
And let’s follow up with this meditation for encouragement that’s called ‘Slow Down You’re Doin’ Fine’ from Katie McLaughlin
Still image is of a cartoon person with long dark hair sitting crossed-legged on a sand dune with other sand dunes in the background.
Whether you spend today slowing down or speeding up, I hope you find a pace that works for you and that let’s you have the space you need. 💚
About Making Space 2023: In December 2020, Fit is a Feminist Issue blogger Martha created a tradition – a series of reminder posts to take good care of ourselves during this last month of the year when it is far too easy to get swept up in your to do list, no matter what you are celebrating or not celebrating.
In 2021, I started doing daily December reminders with a post called Give Yourself Some Space, and that’s how the ‘Making Space‘ December tradition began. Throughout December 2021 and 2022, I wrote a short post that included two videos – one for exercise and one for meditation – and a bit of encouragement for you to make space for yourself at this busy time of year.
These posts are not about cramming more things into your month, they reminding you that there IS a *YOU* who is doing all of the things and that you are worth taking good care of.
Perhaps the things I suggest aren’t what you need at the moment. That’s totally ok. Perhaps you can use something else to create some space, something that will help you feel more relaxed or more in charge of your day. Just do whatever you can to give yourself a little more breathing room.
So, some of these posts may be long and some may be short but please know that every single one of them is written with the hope that you can find a little ease in your day, whatever that looks like for you.
My goal had been to do it all as part of my regular riding for transportation around town. One of my favourites was a 10 km trip to drop of my FIT test at the lab. Consider this a PSA to keep up to date on all your cancer screening tests.
Some of the people in the Facebook Group for challengers thought was a little crazy. Not me. I have written before about becoming a winter cyclist.
It turns out I love winter cycling even more than I love summer cycling. No heat. No bugs. No huge distances to feel like a badass (my 2.5 km commute to work achieves that nicely on a cold or snowy day).
Me in the bike parking garage after commuting to work. I’m wearing a warm hooded blue coat underneath a highly reflective and wind-resistant silver jacket, a neck/head warmer thingy, my blue bicycle ear warmers and my blue and white helmet. My glasses are slightly fogged and I have a little smile.
Good luck getting your distances on the trainer Sam. I’ll keep going so you’ll have company in spirit, even if I can’t actually lend you any of my kms.
But both of us are behind on fundraising. Sam already posted her link. Here’s mine. Please consider helping us both achieve our fundraising targets.
Earlier this year I started a new hobby: ringing in a handbell choir. (See what is a bell choir.) It’s not a physical activity per se, but we see health holistically around here and I’ll bring it back to the fitness stuff.
My previous experience with playing music is next to nil. My only musical training was when I was nine: less than two years of organ lessons and I faked sick for the final recital. I even missed mandatory band class later in my youth because we moved school systems.
So, without the ability to read music it’s no exaggeration that I’m a weak ringer. My mistakes are also easy to notice when I play with folks who have been ringing in church choirs for years. I am also the youngest person with the exception of the conductor, who motivates to keep ringing.
How? She is encouraging, and when she is not actively encouraging she still withholds any negativity. She maintains a neutral positive face, the kind you’re supposed to have when you interview someone for a job. Sometimes she asks only some of us to replay certain sections, and she slows us down, but she never draws attention to me when I make mistakes and I never catch disappointed looks.
I know it’s not always easy for more seasoned folks—especially in groups—to exercise patience around novices. On Monday nights at my curling club I see Scott McDonald giving “Learn to Curl” lessons, and I think: how does this high-ranking curler train these totally new curlers and not get frustrated? Perhaps good trainers are experts, but not all experts are good trainers.
Also, perhaps in times of declining numbers in bell choirs and curling clubs, some folks know they must check their impatience because of what will happen if they don’t. When errors are frequent and progress is slow, novices like me can get discouraged and feel like quitting, even in a supportive learning environment.
So here’s my point: My bell choir experience has reminded me that encouragement and praise are important, even when (especially when?) novices make mistakes. If you are good at something, you may notice mistakes that others make, but it may not help to point them out, even in the spirit of helpfulness. Newbies are probably trying even harder than you are to be patient with themselves. Instead, kind words (even if they seem unearned) might help folks stay in activities that need numbers—so you can keep doing them too.
