Blow Your Stack Saturday: How to Encourage (and Discourage) Exercise

 

Image by ArsAdAstra from Pixabay

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Heyyyy, ya wanna make sure people don't stick with their workout? Just make your exercise routines all about weight loss and having an arbitrarily "perfect" physique! Bingo-bango-bongo, those less-than-perfect types will drop away like flies, leaving you surrounded by only the kinds of hunks and hotties that a superior specimen like you deserves to be in the company of.

What, me, sarcastic? Surely not! This will totally happen and you completely deserve it! Being a body-shaming concern troll in no way means you should crawl back under your bridge. 

All right, I'm setting the Sarcasm Shaker aside now before I risk seasoning this post with too much of a bad thing. Anyway...

As Jennette McCurdy observed in her autobiography, I'm Glad My Mom Died:

People seem to assign thin with “good,” heavy with “bad,” and too thin also with “bad.” There’s such a small window of “good.”

https://amzn.to/3s1wVI1

Nobody deserves to be shamed into hating their body. I just did part of Jeanette DePatie’s Everybody Can Exercise video.

https://amzn.to/3CAEPgq

The participants in the video are real people of all sizes, not leotard-clad Stepford wives. I was only able to get through 15 minutes this time, but now that I’ve found something that I can tell myself to do at least 15 minutes of, and I’m not having to come up with the routines, I think I may be able to keep up with it. My endurance sucks, but I’m hoping to rebuild it.

Body shaming leads people to give up on exercising. I may not be a genius, but that seems pretty damn counter-intuitive to me. As Ragen Chastain of Dances With Fat (https://danceswithfat.wordpress.com) says, you are the boss of your own underpants. Therefore, if you wish to make weight loss the focus of your workout, you may do that. However, there are several reasons why I don’t recommend that approach. More importantly, you don’t have the right to tell anyone else that weight loss needs to be their focus for anything.

These are my realistic goals.

I have asthma and back problems and I’m almost 60 years old. I’ll never be able to run a marathon.

Did I mention that I hate running?

I like swimming. Unfortunately, there is no place to swim in this town. The nearest swimming pool or rec center is going to be a good 60 miles away.

I like walking, but I hate it when I go out in public and the public be there to attagirl me and treat me like I’m mentally deficient because I have physical problems. I don't want to be anyone's inspiration porn.

I also hate it when I encounter unleashed dogs because fuckers in this town think everyone should love their snarling mutt.

All that being said, I think videos like Jeanette’s are routines I can stick to.

I can do at least 15 minutes a day.

It doesn’t feel like a chore.

The routine is led by a compassionate, encouraging person.

One need not be in perfect shape to participate.

There is no fat shaming or thin praising.

It would make me feel proud of myself if I were to exercise regularly again. Hopefully, it will increase my stamina, flexibility, and strength. Perhaps it may even help lower my blood sugar.

What will exercising not do?

It will not make me a better person than people who don’t exercise.

A commitment to physical activity is not a measure of personal worth. I wish people would stop treating it like it was.

~Ornery Owl Has Spoken~

Fat and Ornery

Free use image from Open Clipart Vectors

Inner Champion Workbook Chapter 5: Take the First Step (Fat Friday Edition)

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Fair warning that I am having a dark day despite it being bright and sunny outside. In fact, the bright sunniness makes the inner darkness worse. I hate when people say things like "how can you be depressed when it's so beautiful outside?" Please, if you say that sort of thing to someone who tells you they're feeling depressed, STOP! It doesn't help.

And now, on with the show.

An important goal that I’m going to achieve:

I don't know if this will happen or not, but there is an empty building across the street from my home which is zoned for commercial use. I will be able to access my 401K without penalty at 59, in other words, about four years from now. If the building is still available at that point, I am thinking about investing in it and bringing my idea to life.

"It won't be available then, Cie," you are probably saying. "Real estate goes fast!"

In the city, yes. Not out in the middle of nowhere. The house I'm currently living in had been empty since 2013.

"Well, what the hell do you think you're going to do with a building in the middle of nowhere, Cie?" you say now. 

I am thinking about opening a goat yoga studio.

Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

"Goat yoga?" you sniff. "Who the hell is going to drive to your stupid goat yoga studio in the middle of nowhere?"

As my son observed when I postulated that I could probably pull in a few yuppies from Denver to drive out to Podunk on weekends for a goat yoga session:

"Denver? You mean Boulder."

He's right.

"Oh, and are you going to teach yoga, you disabled lardass? Who would want to take a class from you?"

No, I'm not, because I don't know the first thing about teaching yoga. I plan to put out a call for volunteer instructors, who would be allowed to record their sessions, pass out business cards, recruit people to sign up for their regular classes, and have a tip jar available.

By the way, a big rule at my studio will be this:

NO BODY SHAMING!

No fat-shaming.

No thin praising.

No encouragement of weight loss. No selling weight loss programs.

I want to provide an encouraging environment for every body. I want my studio to operate with a Health at Every Size (and every ability) approach.

Why this goal is important to me:

Most yoga classes shame larger students, behaving as if a literal monster just walked into the room when a big person comes in. It is also difficult for disabled students to find a class. I want the classes at my studio to encourage EVERY BODY, regardless of size or physical ability.

Image by filinecek from Pixabay

Why goat yoga?

Well, for those who have never heard of it, goat yoga is actually a thing. The presence of the goats is shown to have a calming and encouraging effect on those participating in the class. The goats won't have to learn the yoga poses. They'll be free to wander in and out of the classroom. And if a participant spends the entire session just playing with the goats, that's perfectly fine! Basically, the goats are therapy animals.

What has been preventing me from taking the first step?
Lack of access to funds.

How can I remove these obstacles or work around them?

Currently, I'm just waiting for four years and hoping nobody buys the place in the meantime. I also have a potential secondary site in mind.

The first step I am going to take toward achieving my goal:

I am currently making micro-investments with my small and undependable pay. I am hoping these will start generating passive income. I am also trying to promote my freelance literary services, as well as continuing to do reviews. I am going to apply to Kirkus Reviews at the beginning of next year in the hopes of bringing in another income stream.

For support and accountability, I am going to share my goal with:
My son knows, and now you all do too.

I feel better after writing this post. Sending positive energy to Lauren for the gift of her workbook, to Linda for the gift of Health at Every Size which helped me break out of the diet mindset almost 10 years ago, and to Caroline for the encouragement not to fall back into that limiting mindset.

Here are a couple more books to help you say FUCK YOU to diet culture and instead concentrate on REAL health, both mental and physical.