On Working Out and Eating

Remember the time that I tried to go running again? Total failure. I will never put myself through such a horrible activity again. Why would anyone want to feel like they are going to die?

**Side note-- In case you haven't noticed yet, anything awful is always described as something where I "feel like I am going to die." What you don't know yet is that I also usually say "it makes me want to punch them in the face" if someone does something evil or annoying. Just ask my co-workers. No, I'm not violent or constantly thinking of death. No, the people I'm referring to are not my students. I don't hit students. Yes, I probably should stop saying the punch them in the face thing. Ok, that was way too long of a side note. I hope you skipped that.

What I was trying to get at was that since I don't like doing things that are going to make me feel like I am going to die, why not do things that are going to make me feel like I am going to die times ten. Enter Shape magazine short burst training exercise videos. It's basically circuit training minus the weights. I'm a weakling, especially when it comes to my arms. As I like to say, I've got no powder in my guns. They aren't loaded. The gun show is pretty lame. These videos use your own weight which is enough for me.

This is pretty much what you sign up for when you decide to do this:



I don't really know how I stumbled across the videos, but I did and they have become my new workout routine. There are a bunch of different ones all with the same type of idea on their website. The guy in the video is super annoying so I mute him and put on some good music instead. I recommend you do the same or you might want to punch him in the face.

In case you think this doesn't look hard, don't be fooled. Andrew watched one of the videos and made fun of me for feeling like I was going to die. He then tried to do one and thought he was going to die. And I like to feel like I'm going to die so much that I am known to do two of these workouts in a row.

This is not all people. (Longest blog post ever.) I hate diets. I think they are stupid. Sorry to those of you that diet. The best way to get in shape is to exercise and eat a balanced diet in moderate portions. I knew that I was probably eating way too big of portions, so I wanted to find an app that determined calories in foods just so that I could get an idea of what I was putting into my body.

Andrew and I have both been using My Fitness Pal that tracks calorie intake, weight gain or loss, and exercise. We cook pretty much all of our meals from scratch. We like fresh food. Not food that has weird chemicals, lots of salt, and other strange by-products. I've pretty much eaten this way my entire life growing up, so to me I don't even think about it. The app lets you create recipes where you can input all of the ingredients you used-- perfect! It also has a huge database of foods down to specific brands.

Needless to say, by tracking what I've been eating, I've been able to see what a normal portion of food should be compared to one that is way too big. Instead of cutting things out (which I think actually does more harm than good in the long run) I just take smaller portions. Why shouldn't I be able to enjoy eating food? It seems so weird to deprive yourself of things you enjoy eating when if you're doing it moderation it is fine! Over the long run, I think that this will help me understand portion sizes which is the biggest issue that most people struggle with.

No, I'm not overweight. But I've been out of shape and it feels good to be kicking some butt and getting back into a routine again. And if you've gotten this far, I applaud you for reading my novel about working out and eating well. What do you do to exercise and eat in a healthy way?