bodies_in_motion

okay so like

exercise that

* won't fuck with any of my disabilities
* won't feel impossible to start or maintain
* won't get blockaded by my executive function or wtfever before I get started
* won't cost money
* won't make me feel like a fail on the grounds of continuing to not meet the 150 min/wk moderate exercise guideline
* won't tempt me into excessive ambition
* will help me learn patience
* will help me increase some number of my strength, flexibility, endurance, and cardiovascular health
* will start where I am wrt all four such
* will be enjoyable, not chorelike

am I chasing a unicorn here?

(I really appreciate the effort you all put in last time I posted here! just none of your suggestions stuck. /o\ and it's incredibly frustrating.)

(also I don't understand why I chose today to start caring again? I have been complaining all week about through-the-roof pain! this is maybe not the week to reinstate a practice of physicality?)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

alexseanchai

that makes a lot of sense. probably keeps it interesting through variety, too?

thanks :)

From:

rydra_wong

Yup! And it also works well if I can't do a particular thing because of injury (or weather, or travelling, or whatever).

For me, I'll often work on the basis that I want to try to do activity X at least once in the week and Y at least twice and so on (though that plan gets adjusted and re-shuffled fairly regularly, depending on my priorities and how different things are going). So there's a very loose structure.

But then I can be flexible about what gets slotted in on which day, or if I do X more than once if I have lots of spare energy/time that week (or whatever).

And there are fallback options, so if even if the general plan just isn't happening that week, I'll generally do some movement-ish stuff of some kind, just because I feel physically and mentally better when I'm not totally immobile.

That's the theory, anyway ... *g*

From:

alexseanchai

excellent. shall ponder and poke at such a plan for myself then :)

From:

rydra_wong

Glad it's a useful idea for you!

Just having a "menu" of items could work as a starting place.

Then you can see what are the things you can motivate yourself to do, what effects they have, add or subtract different menu items, etc..

And then add in more struture or not as you want.

From:

rydra_wong

Also!

I highly recommend making one of the options stupidly easy and low-key. Something that feels ridiculously low-dose for you.

Like, ten minutes of something really gentle. Five minutes. Done listening to a podcast or watching TV, if that's something you enjoy.

(Looking up "restorative yoga" poses could be good for this.)

The idea is to make the bar so low that you can manage to do it even on really bad days, most of the time. Sometimes you'll do it and then find actually you now feel like doing a bit more, sometimes you won't, and that's fine.

And (aside from helping build the habit of exercise), a short stint of something like restorative yoga can actually be enough to make a difference in how you feel (at least in my experience, YMMV, etcc.).

From:

alexseanchai

"Absurdly easy, low-key, and low-dose" sounds...well, okay, it's got my ego complaining up a storm, but it also sounds perfect for today given the various givens. In fact I believe I shall look up restorative yoga right now, and then attempt five minutes of that when the ice pack comes off my toe. (It got bit by a chair yesterday :P owww.)

Okay. Cool. Thanks!

From:

rydra_wong

"Absurdly easy, low-key, and low-dose" sounds...well, okay, it's got my ego complaining up a storm

*nods a lot* *g*

If it's something that seems pathetically and insultingly easy when you're having a good day (whether that's in terms of energy or mood or executive functioning or pain levels or whatever), then it's something that you might actually be able to do on a bad day! Or just a tired day, or a day when you need to recover after a more strenuous thing the previous day.

And seriously, the more stuff I do, the more I'm learning to appreciate the real value of the gentle/easy stuff. It's not some sort of wimpy option that you only do because you can't do "real exercise". Especially when I'm doing strenuous stuff some of the time, I need the gentle stuff to recover (and it's good for my head).

There's a yoga teacher named J. Brown who has a vid named "Gentle is the New Advanced" which I keep meaning to check out, and yeah; I really like that as a slogan.

From:

indywind

Seconding this whole thread from

rydra_wong, but especially this last bit^.

You know how similar exercises can have a variety of benefits depending how you do them? For instance, you can build cardio-respiratory fitness, or muscular endurance, or muscular strength, or explosive speed/power, or precision control, or range-of-motion/flexibility, or balance, or postural alignment, or proprioception, or some other things I can't think of right now, or pretty often a few of these at the same time but never all of them at once (because multitasking to that degree is not possible and some of the functions oppose each other)...?

It helps me to remember that ego-satisfying fast/hard/heavy/impressive workouts only give some of the benefits of exercise. The other benefits require the other kind of work: slow, careful, gentle, light, basic (or as I'd rather say, foundational). This end of the spectrum can be surprisingly challenging to work on. Mentally and emotionally, of course-- it often isn't as ego-gratifying, especially for folks who've soaked up the "no pain no gain, go big or go home" propaganda, and isn't as exciting, attention-focusing, endorphin-producing as moving faster or harder. But also, the slow/gentle/basic end of the spectrum can be physically more challenging. Especially if done with maintaining effective mechanics and alignment throughout, and not relying on momentum or rebound effects.

Need a convincing illustration? Do a set of pushups (I think I remember that pushups are a thing you can do? any variation is fine-- traditional, from the knees, against the wall, whatever; howevermany is a set for you). That's your "typical exercise." Then take 30 seconds to do just one pushup (again, whatever flavor you do) with perfect form, OR hold in plank position (if your pushup flavor is against the wall, hold at the bottom of your wall pushup, with elbows at 90 degrees). That's your "easy" exercise. Then lay down flat on your back or belly and take slow breaths for another 30 seconds. That's your "boring rest" which may feel anything but boring after the 2 minutes immediately prior. Altogether, you've had about 3 minutes of exercise; this is "low dose"...but you'll probably feel it the next day, and give you fitness benefits if you repeat it a few times a week.

tl;dr : "Easy" isn't easy--and it's good for you.

From:

alexseanchai

I remember a line in Seanan McGuire's Every Heart a Doorway to the tune of Nancy—who, it was earlier established, had put in some thousands of hours practicing how to stand perfectly still—being really strong, precisely because of that unexciting form of exercise. That something like what you're talking about?

*nods slowly*

I mean, I keep telling people "I need patience. Is there an instantaneous way to get me some?" :P but like. I really do need patience...

Thanks.

From:

indywind

Something like that, yeah.

Also, if you've ever had physical therapy to rehab an injury or sometimes a treatable handicapping condition, that's another illustration. It's usually very simple movements, 'easy' to start, with a focus on doing them exactly as prescribed, on a regular schedule. They're not exciting or showy (hardly anyone ever says "hey, look at me, I can flex and extend my ankle! without using my hands! twice in a row!" even if that's an accomplishment for them). Those exercises are beyond unexciting and unimpressive; they're boring as heck. But, highly effective.

From:

rydra_wong

There's the distinction between "hard" and "soft" styles in martial arts, which doesn't exactly map onto this but seems relevant to the sort of thing we're talking about.

And then you've got "yin yoga" -- very long (3-5 mins or more) holds of positions which require minimal muscular effort to hold, and which is very effective (and one of the few things I've found helpful when I'm in bad anxious/agitated states).

Or "restorative yoga", which isn't even "extreme" in the way yin yoga can be (in that yin yoga does involve sinking slowly into intense stretches); it's very gentle, very easy-seeming, very comfortable, and really really powerful.

For me, I think because in the last seven years or so I've been doing some fairly strenuous things (like rock climbing and barbell lifts), and because I'm also prone to very fluctuating energy/mood levels, I've become really conscious of how much impact the "soft" (or "gentle" or "easy") practices on my menu have, and what happens if I ignore them (or try to do strenuous stuff all the time, which is a total disaster).

Also, in terms of learning patience, it's definitely a real mental exercises to go: okay, forget whatever grand ambitions I may have had for the day, actually I woke up feeling like utter crap for no apparent reason, here is where I am today, so what is a movement thing that a) I can actually do, and b) might be positive for me right now?

N.B. If I'm making it sound like I'm all sorted and full of wisdom about this: DON'T BELIEVE IT, IT'S LIES, ALL LIES. *g*

It's a work in progress. This is stuff I have sort of figured out, and manage to put into practice quite a lot of the time.