A rambling not so sleepy Friday
Do you ever wake up feeling extremely tired? Are you human? Yes and yes, of course!
Well, I woke up feeling tired. I like to get my workouts done in the morning before work so that in the evening, I can relax. Lately, I’ve been having trouble with this because I don’t have nearly the amount of energy in the morning as I do in the evening and afternoon. For the past few months or so, I’ve been working out in the early morning hours but my workouts have definitely been subpar.
Over the summer, I would stumble over to my gym (luckily it is within walking distance or I may never make it) and do a half an hour of moderate cardio on the elliptical or bike. The problem was I wasn’t really pushing myself to workout hard. I tried eating something small or a cup of juice before working out and nothing seemed to really work. I just felt sluggish.
So the months went by and I was working out every morning but not seeing very good results, meaning I still hadn’t lost my college weight and toned up. What gives, I thought.
This week, I finally realized that when I wake up I just need to grab something quick to drink like water, brush my teeth, wash my face, and just jump over to the gym. (I got pretty bad about wasting 10-20 minutes of being sluggish in the morning before going to the gym.) I try and tell myself to hurry up and get going so that I can have it over and done with. When I get to the gym, I undoubtedly still feel tired but I’ve found a new trick to get my butt burning calories!
<dramatic, suspensful pause ;)>
The answer to my problem is simply a hard, and I mean muscle burning hard, workout and quick. If I tell myself that I just need to bust it for 15-20 minutes for an activity, I find that my energy somewhat returns (mentally perhaps?) and I can get a good workout in the morning. I got inspired yesterday morning reading Women’s Health Magazine when I came across a “crossfit-inspired workout.” See my Workout page for the specific exercise I did on Thursday, November 8. It made it so much easier to grab some energy for this workout when I told myself, only 15 minutes you can do this. Oh, and my music on my iPhone is always an instant pump up for me!
Working out is not always fun (is it ever?) but learning about what works and what doesn’t for your individual body makes it a whole lot easier. I’m not naturally thin nor do I jump out of bed in the morning (you can ask my friends and they will tell you how they sometimes hear my alarm clock before me- oops!) but I’m eager to find a good balance to living a healthy life through working out and exercising while being just a normal, relateable girl. I like to try new things in everything that I do in life. Exercising is definitely a major part of my life and I’m excited to start this blog to talk about how to make working out and staying healthy an easier task for everyone. I plan to document my workouts, tricks I find along the way, food recipes, and general life tips along my road of being just your average 20-something year old lady!
Oh, and this morning, I got a jump start on the healthy wagon with a good breakfast. I made pumpkin oatmeal. I used the recipe from Chocolate Covered Katie’s Pumpkin Pie Oatmeal with a few adjustments. I didn’t have any pumpkin pie spice and I also halved the recipe because I wasn’t super hungry. It was really good!
Quote for the day: “A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.” -Steve Martin
