Last Saturday I was unable to get to the gym for my planned workout because my car sprung an antifreeze leak and a friend was coming by to take a look at it in exchange for dinner. Now that's a deal I can't pass up. He spent the better part of the day trying to find the leak, but to no avail. No leak was located. After making dinner and a pie for my friend, my son, his fiance, and my daughter, I was not brave enough to drive to the gym late at night and risk a breakdown. I was rather upset!
I remembered advice offered by my dear friend, Evie, that I should take a yoga class to relieve my stress. She had been suggesting it for years and I had been resisting. So, I went into FitClick to find a beginner's yoga program that would allow me to do a workout at home and try to relieve some of my vehicle related stress. About 30 minutes into the workout, with sweat pouring down my face and muscles aching that I didn't know I had, my dear friend called. I told her that her advice was crap! Yoga wasn't a stress reliever! Yoga was a death wish!
She asked me what I had been doing and I described some of it. She assured me that the program I was trying was NOT a beginner's program and that, if I were to try gentle yoga I would have a very different experience. While I told her I would try it, I refused to believe that sweating and hurting could possibly be a stress reliever.
On Tuesday, my car stopped leaking antifreeze! Instead, it decided to spew antifreeze. Most assuredly not an improvement! It decided to do this while I was dropping my daughter off on my way to the gym. Luckily for me, my mechanic is located just a few blocks from where I was dropping my daughter and on the way to the gym. I dropped my car at the mechanic and walked the few blocks to the gym. I neglected to consider that, after my workout, I would need to walk three and half miles to get home, in addition to the half mile I walked to get to the gym!
Today, I was scheduled to pick my car up. My boyfriend was at work. I called him and suggested that I would drive his car to pick up my car and leave his car at the mechanic's and he could get off his bus at a stop near the mechanic's and drive home. He recently injured his knee and said that I couldn't take his car because he couldn't walk the five blocks from the bus to his car. I was REALLY angry! I also really needed my car. So I walked the 3.0 miles to pick up my car. Then I had to rush to a meeting, so I couldn't go to the gym. My stress level was building rapidly because I would have missed two days at the gym if I didn't go today and would have to go Sunday when I usually stay home to watch the Eagles, AAAARRRGH!
When I got home from my meeting at 10 p.m., I decided to go to the gym. I did half an hour on the treadmill. As I walked over to do my 30 minute circuit, I realized that I was smiling and jamming to the music on my MP3 player! By the time I finished the 30 minute circuit, at almost 12:30 a.m., I realized that I was no longer the least bit irritated but had a wonderful sense of tired well being.
Guess I'm going to start looking for that gentle yoga class! I finally believe Evie. Sweating and pain do relieve stress! Four weeks into my goal and I'm finally a convert instead of a resistant fat chick!
