So you may have been wondering since this is a food and fitness blog where the blogs are on fitness. You have seen many meal plans which will continue but it is about time I shared with you what I love about fitness as part of a healthy lifestyle as well and decided to start with a little about my fitness journey.
In my young 20’s I opened a dance and gymnastics studio, where I also taught fitness classes and later jazzerice. I started teaching the fitness classes after having my first baby (with both kids I gained over 70lbs). Six months later I still had most of the weight to lose and thought if I was teaching classes each morning at 5:30AM then I would be making myself workout. It was my logic on making myself disciplined to workout each day and give 100%, create a class where I had to be there for other people and they would be watching how hard I was working. So did research, went to classes, got certifications and began instructing. This form of “discipline” because I was required to show up at a certain time is how I did fitness for for almost 15 years and honestly loved it. The women who attended my classes each morning became some of my best lifelong friends. In the early years when our group was small we even had a book club while we worked out.
Some important lessons I learned in this part of the journey.
1)Fitness was more fun with friends…a lot more fun! Friends made me accountable to keep working out and I looked forward to working out together. Our commitment to our group, each other, and our fitness made our friendships even stronger. So find some friends to work out with, or make some new at fitness class.
2)Discipline—I did best and still do when I created some accountability so I didn’t have to rely on my own daily discipline. It wasn’t even enough for me in the beginning to join a class I needed to teach it. What can you put into place to help you stay disciplined?
3)Fun and Fitness I enjoyed—I have always loved to dance and dancing as part of fitness made it fun for me. Now I love mixing up my fitness with strength, different types of classes and the endorphins make me enjoy the workout too.
Since moving and leaving the dance studio, I explored new avenues in fitness. I knew it was important to me to have exercise as part of my healthy lifestyle. I loved how it exercise made me feel more healthy, gave me more energy, how I felt more strong and well like everyone else part of the year I would be in a swimsuit and I might as well be happy!!
For a couple years I did Beachbody fitness routines. Starting with Insanity and working through several more. I was committed to working hard, disciplined at doing them early in the morning as part of my routine and loved the results when I was giving 100% effort. It was great because I didn’t have to leave my home and the workouts pushed me.
About a year ago I decided I really wanted to work on strength training and lifting heavy weights so I joined a gym and began working with an amazing trainer. (Omaha readers I could hook you up!) I will write more about my personal training experience in another blog because it was so impactful in my fitness journey and knowledge. I learned so much about how to improve my technique, and how Lifting HEAVY really transformed my body, and how to develop a fitness routine that worked for my life and my goals. I loved being challenged, getting stronger, and seeing results. Plus I added in fun, challenging new fitness classes that brought back everything I loved from before.
Fitness as part of your life is so much more than losing or maintaining weight, and for me the mental health benefits far outweigh the physical ones. Stay tuned for fitness tips on how you can learn to love your fitness routine and see results you love too!