The Exercise Motivation Thread - 2016

[LTS3]

 
@LTS3  It's a universal law that any attempt to do yoga with a cat in the room will lead to cat hair all over your yoga mat and possibly claw marks all over it too.

Everything gets covered in cat hair

I have my yoga mat hanging on an over-the-door-hook so no worries about cat claws or much hair there. At the first yoga class at work, one of the event organizers said that she had her mat standing up right in a corner of her bedroom and her cat thought it was a scratching post so she scratched away

The yoga mat has gouged out holes in one area.

I downloaded two free yoga apps last night, Yoga -Track Yoga and Yoga.com. Both have a bunch of free yoga progams for all different levels and videos of different poses and there are more available but those you have to pay for. I tried out the first app and used the Bedtime yoga program. It was all seated and lying down poses so easy enough for me to do. The one annoying thng is that I had to hold my phone in one hand and keep watching the video while lying down so I could see how to do all the poses because "supine twist pose" means nothing to me. Not exactly relaxing. Emma sat on the bed and stared at me. Leroy kept poking his drippy wet nose (normal for him) on my legs and feet.

 

[Columbine]

@LTS3
 It's a universal law that any attempt to do yoga with a cat in the room will lead to cat hair all over your yoga mat and possibly claw marks all over it too.

Cat hair/dog hair and claw marks I can take...its when I start finding bits of straw or hay I start to worry.....I wonder if there's something that Collie needs to tell me :lol3:

Still no yoga or formal exercise :anon: but I did clean the holiday cottage today. I guess that counts for something....

I wanted to do yoga so badly, but cleaning had to come first and I was pretty dead by the time it was done :shame: (to be honest, I was ready to go back to bed by 9am :anon: ) Need to snap out of this and stop being so damn lazy all the time :frusty:

LTS3 - I don't know if this'll help, but in poses like warrior, lunge etc you really want to think of your weight being evenly distributed between your front and back feet. Widening your stance a little so your legs are hip width apart can really help stability too With Tree, that definitely takes a while to master. In addition to having a static focus point, I find consciously engaging my core, pushing my foot and thigh into each other with equal pressure and not locking my standing leg all really help too. Also, do remember that some days will always be better than others. I can have no problem holding Tree pose one day, and the next day be wobbling all over the place. Don't stress about it - if you fall, you fall. Just come right back into the pose....and don't take yourself too seriously. I alleyways find laughing at myself helps on bad balance days :winkblue:

 

[jtbo]

Upper body workout, 30 minutes, included lifting weights, swinging sword, throwing small trees around as well throwing big tire around, also upwards and catching it. I did not allow resting periods between moves, too many mosquitoes for that, I call them my personal trainers and yes, they are a touch bunch!

Quite a while ago I bought bench to do crunches with, it came with kind of bungee things that you are supposed to pull to stretch, they are meant for someone else, I barely feel resistance until their flexing ability is at end already. It came also with hand dumbbells, problem with those is that they are only about 2 pounds and that is way too light for me, I use 20 pounds for some move, more for others.

For one move I use 10 pounds though, that is when you have dumbbell on your hand then you lift arm straight forward so that palm is facing down and hold it there for few seconds palm facing ground and arm straight ahead, then as many repeats as I can, which is not too many. Burns forearm quite a lot, I don't know name of that move or if it is any official move, but those muscles don't get much use normally and when I need them they are letting me down so often, that is why I try to strengthen them that way.

Oh yes, I did also javelin throwing, I used wooden "stick" that is used to put grass to dry, it is put to ground and grass/hay is piled on it, I guess there is proper name for it too, but Wikipedia does not have even English page for it, so I don't know if it is Scandinavian thing or used more commonly around the world:
https://fi.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinäseiväs

I'm sure there are a lot of words that translator can't comprehend, even I don't know many of those old farming words, but those stacks of hay are synonym of romantic countryside for many in our culture.

 

[LTS3]

@LTS3 - I don't know if this'll help, but in poses like warrior, lunge etc you really want to think of your weight being evenly distributed between your front and back feet. Widening your stance a little so your legs are hip width apart can really help stability too

With Tree, that definitely takes a while to master. In addition to having a static focus point, I find consciously engaging my core, pushing my foot and thigh into each other with equal pressure and not locking my standing leg all really help too. Also, do remember that some days will always be better than others. I can have no problem holding Tree pose one day, and the next day be wobbling all over the place. Don't stress about it - if you fall, you fall. Just come right back into the pose....and don't take yourself too seriously. I alleyways find laughing at myself helps on bad balance days

I'm doing yoga mostly for fun and to de-stress

I think an actual class would help. I'm just doing whatever is offered at work that fits into my schedule. There are plenty of yoga studios in the area, just have to go through Yelp reviews and studio web sites to find a beginners class that is offered at time that works for me.

I think I'm standing wide enough for balance but maybe not. I'll give it a try.

I going to do another quickie yoga session from one of the apps later. My parents make me

 

[Winchester]

4 miles on the treadmill this morning

(I had a load of laundry in the dryer and was waiting for the dryer buzzer to ring. Got to 3.5 miles and figured that about the time I went upstairs, the dryer would buzz and I'd have to turn around and come back down anyway. So I just stayed on the treadmill til the dryer was finished. And got 4 miles in.)

 

[Columbine]

30-35mins vinyasa yoga this morning. Hurt like hell (bad back spasms) but did it anyway.

 

[Winchester]

30-35mins vinyasa yoga this morning. Hurt like hell (bad back spasms) but did it anyway.

I know, Columbine. Believe me, I know. Good job! 

 

[artiemom]

30-35mins vinyasa yoga this morning. Hurt like hell (bad back spasms) but did it anyway.

Be careful.....

gentle does it..

 

[LTS3]

I managed 15 minutes of yoga last night. I didn't feel totally relaxed afterwards though. I think I need to have some yoga / meditation type music playing to really relax, like the yoga classes at work. I was looking on iTunes for music yesterday and I liked a few albums but they are pricey at $12+ each

None are available through the local library network, maybe because they're fairly new albums. I did request one meditation music album from the library that I found from searching the catalog. I couldn't find the album on iTunes to listen to a preview so I have no idea if the music is anything I would like or not. We'll see.

 

[jtbo]

I managed 15 minutes of yoga last night. I didn't feel totally relaxed afterwards though. I think I need to have some yoga / meditation type music playing to really relax, like the yoga classes at work. I was looking on iTunes for music yesterday and I liked a few albums but they are pricey at $12+ each :slant: None are available through the local library network, maybe because they're fairly new albums. I did request one meditation music album from the library that I found from searching the catalog. I couldn't find the album on iTunes to listen to a preview so I have no idea if the music is anything I would like or not. We'll see.

How about something like this?

[VIDEO]https://www.youtube.com/embed/?v=0YCAcXiHEdk[/VIDEO]

 

[artiemom]

 
I managed 15 minutes of yoga last night. I didn't feel totally relaxed afterwards though. I think I need to have some yoga / meditation type music playing to really relax, like the yoga classes at work. I was looking on iTunes for music yesterday and I liked a few albums but they are pricey at $12+ each

None are available through the local library network, maybe because they're fairly new albums. I did request one meditation music album from the library that I found from searching the catalog. I couldn't find the album on iTunes to listen to a preview so I have no idea if the music is anything I would like or not. We'll see.

Try Pandora. They may have a station which is somewhat in tune with what you are looking for. 

I listen to Pandora a lot.. It is not all that expensive, $4.24 a month, including tax. They have a lot of stations.

I did go to the gym today. I only did a mile on the elliptical. I was at a 13 minute mile pace, but my heart rate went up, so I had to watch it and slow down a bit. I ended up with a 19 minute mile. At one point I was at 3.4 mph... that is really good for me.

I did the other stuff also. Being careful with my elbows and shoulder. Shoulder was sore on Friday. 

 

[Columbine]

LTS3 - do you have Amazon Prime? There's a ton of yoga music available free with Prime Music. It's all downloadable onto your phone too - you just can't transfer it onto your computer or other music playing apps. I've virtually doubled my yoga music library this way

 

[LTS3]

No I don't have Amazon Prime or Pandora. A lot of the music I have in my iTunes library are from CDs I checked out of the library and uploaded and then moved to my iPod. I have no clue how to put music on my phone

I have a basic data plan on my phone so I try not to use it very much for Internet access and downloading stuff unless I absolutely need to.

How does Spotify work? The person who does the yoga classes at work uses Spotify too play music during class and it's on her phone. Can Spotify be used on a regular computer?

Might skip doing yoga today. Just exhausted from being at work earlier even though it wasn't that bad for once

I do have some 15,000 steps already which is pretty good for a Sunday

 

[Columbine]

No I don't have Amazon Prime or Pandora. A lot of the music I have in my iTunes library are from CDs I checked out of the library and uploaded and then moved to my iPod. I have no clue how to put music on my phone :anon: I have a basic data plan on my phone so I try not to use it very much for Internet access and downloading stuff unless I absolutely need to.

How does Spotify work? The person who does the yoga classes at work uses Spotify too play music during class and it's on her phone. Can Spotify be used on a regular computer?

Spotify can be used on a regular computer, but it uses data too AND you have to pay a subscription to download (though I think they offer a week's free trial - they certainly did last month).

For what it's worth, I have a VERY limited data plan on my phone too. I just do all my downloading via WiFi If you can get WiFi access, I'd say that plus the Spotify free trial is your cheapest option.

 

[Norachan]

An hour of yoga and a 25 minute run yesterday.

2 hours of very energetic cleaning followed by an hour of yoga today. So tired now, but I might try to go for a run later.

 

[tammat]

Norachan nice new avatar pic.

I was at a retail trade fair yesterday and then did some shopping. I walked all day except to sit down to eat.
Today I did my back heavy and chest light. I ordered a Lat pull down bar for my trainer last week because I really need one for this new programme. It arrived today after I had finished training. :doh3: it will be great for next Monday
I did my work at the gymnastics club then did 10 mins of cardio this evening. Boy oh Boy my cardio fitness needs working on big time. I really struggled. :anon:
That's something to work on. A new mini goal for me

Keep going everybody. Go! go! Go!

 

[LTS3]

Looks like the Spotify does have a free option: https://www.spotify.com/us/free/ I'll look into the details tonight.

I always thought that using WiFi counts towards the MBs on my data plan

I vaguely remember someone telling me not to use WiFi all the time.

I'm aiming for 10,000 steps by lunch time today. Usually I can get pretty close to it.

 

[Norachan]

@Norachan nice new avatar pic.

 

Thanks Tammat. I'm hoping it will bring me some luck. Gin managed to dash out the door about 5 weeks ago and is off running wild in the forest somewhere.

I keep going on long walks to look for him, but at this time of year he's probably having so much fun that he's in no hurry to come back.

 

[Winchester]

3.5 miles on the treadmill this morning. They were hard miles, too, because I hurt today. I got to 2.5 miles and came "this close" to saying the heck with it. Then I got to 3 miles and figured well, I got this far, I might as go for it. And got my miles in. But my butt and down my leg really hurt for some reason.

 

[Columbine]

No exercise so far...apart from walking up the hill into town (maybe 15-20mins mostly steep hills), and walking round the nearest city a little looking for my bank (couldn't find it - wasn't where I thought it was :doh3: ).

....unless sitting and rocking half the day counts as exercise..... :disturb: ​

REALLY want to go running right now....or walk to the gym (20mins up and down hills), join and do a ton of cardio....


:hmm: Do I want to risk being crippled tomorrow or not.... :disturb: