Friday, October 16, 2009

What Makes Your Body Smile?





Recently I started exercising again. Over the years I have walked, hiked, snowshoed and danced. I've taken yoga, tai chi and bellydancing classes. But the one I always keep coming back home to, is a little-known 15-minute-a-day aerobic exercise called 'Oxycise'. I can't even remember how I came across it, but one day after we first moved to Utah I found it online, ordered the how-to video and fell in love.

Since starting it up again over a week ago, my stomach is tighter and flatter (a welcome surprise because I was wondering what I was giving birth to), my face is more defined and I am becoming more flexible.

The other benefit I've noticed is more energy and confidence over all, and since beginning I have been doing more and feeling more can-do about life in general. It has lifted me out of the funk-tank I've found myself swimming in since leaving my job last June.

What has freaked the heck out of me is being unable to do the sitting butterfly, a pose I had done with ease before. Middle age? Excessive weight? General out-of-shapeness? Which ever it is, I'm not ready to start heading for the hill just yet, thanks.

So I'm going to keep up with this and slowly move into other things. I really miss the park near our old house, with it's tree-lined walking trails. Miss trekking in snowshoes on the middle school track nearby during winter months. But Oxycise, especially when I keep the sliding glass door to the balcony open for fresh air, is a close-second, and and I don't have to bundle up and drive anywhere to get a workout.

Now how about you? What makes your body/heart/mind smile? What energizes, uplifts and motivates you to keep on going?

10 comments:

  1. I like biking riding... especially now that it is cooler out
    I will have to check out the Oxycise

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  2. I like magic- just simple candle spells and invoking the powers of the universe to help me out. And I'm ignoring the scale now. 'Doing by not doing' ;) but I do need to get out more. I remember the Oxycise; but I liked Richard better :)Do you still have those tapes?

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  3. Shana, a vision of me riding a bike (preferably on some French sun-lit countryside, lol) keeps popping up in my head. I remember how glorious bike-riding was in my youth. The wind in your hair....

    BlogGirl, having feng-shuid the scale a long time ago, I too am ignoring it. No longer have the Richard Simmons tapes :( but then I spent more time watching him bounce around to his groove than working out with him so it's just as well. Your candles must be AWESOME!

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  4. What an odd name! I'm glad it's working so well for you. I've always been a walker, and just a couple of months ago began Bikram Yoga (the kind done in a really hot room).

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  5. I know, right? But oddly spot-on, since it's all about the breath' the taking in of lots of oxygen, with resistance, so oxygen + exercise= :). Yoga rocks! A favorite routine is the Tibetan Rites, but haven't tried Bikram yet...

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  6. I have the videos/cassette tapes from forever ago too! I think it is great & it gets us breathing. Oxygen deprivation goodbye :)

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  7. Jodi, I always thought somehow that Oxycise practice gave us an edge with Quantum Touch!

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  8. I love to walk around my neighborhood.

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  9. I've been swimming, about 4 miles a week. My face seems a little thinner, but nothing more. I like to glide through the water, thinking. Thinking about something I'm writing, a conversation I should have. Then I like on my back and float.

    Then, I have a beer to wipe out the good I did myself. I need to look into Oxycise.

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  10. You made me laugh with your beer crack! Wait, that didn't sound right...Swimming, I'd forgotten to add swimming. I did it a few times this summer for a couple of hours each time, and the only drawback was having to crawl out of the water after being weightless for so long. That's when I realized, woah, put on some pounds have we? But it made me feel good for a week (each swimfest).

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