The days are going by! I am still kind of in a funk, but at the same time I am staying positive. There are a few reasons I have been able to stay so positive. One of them is that I keep reminding myself how LUCKY i am to be able to do the things that I do. I have the privelige to eat healthy foods and exercise daily. So many people are lucky to get ANY food and there are so many people with health issues or physical issues that prevent them from working out, or merely WALKING. I am truly blessed to have the opportunity to push my body hard every day. The second reason will tie in with my day….
This morning I woke up for boxing. My instructor, Steve, has decided that he is going to push me EXTRA hard these last few weeks leading up to my competition. He truly did. I did extra sets and had barely any rest at all this morning in class. If you have ever taken a good boxing class, you KNOW how hard it is not to take a breather!! He totally kicked my butt and made sure that everyone knew that was his plan. His words to me this morning were “It will look like you got caught in a down pour by the time you leave today.” Thanks Steve!! haha
Our boxing class is small. Sometimes there are only 2-3 people…and at most 9, but that is rare. There are 3-4 of us who come almost every single class. We have all been going for a while and if one of us isn’t there, we wonder why. Kris is an amazing woman with 3 children. She is in her 50’s and that girl can KICK SOME ASS. She throws a mean punch and I would NOT want to get on her bad side. Lately she hasn’t been coming as often. Her husband has been suffering from pancreatic cancer and is on his last few months. Today in class she was talking about how her and her family were going to Brazil. Her concern with this trip? That she would have to make arrangements to bring her husbands body back, should he die on the trip. This made me think, “and i think I HAVE PROBLEMS?!?!!” It made me angry at myself for getting mad about over eating, for getting down on myself about not looking the way i want to look. I felt pathetic for it. I have kept her in my thoughts all day and everytime i start to get down on myself, I reflect on that. It breaks my heart to see such a great person going through so much. (and she still manages to work out many days each week.) That is inspiration right there.
Anyways, this morning after my brutal boxing class, I decided my legs needed a beating. I’m so mean to my body 🙂 It’s for it’s own good though! I did squats, split squats, leg extensions, hack squats, and a few calf exercises, followed by plyos-high knees, butt kickers, box jumps, side to side box jumps, high skips, and a bunch of other random things that i threw in there. 3 sets of those. If that wasn’t enough, I decided I didn’t feel like the treadmill, or the elliptical, I wanted to continue in this ass-kicking, so I took a spin class. I rarely take spin classes because I don’t know how much I actually enjoy them. Most of my workouts, although they can be extremely hard, I enjoy the intensity and pushing myself to my limits and beyond. Spin, just doesn’t make me feel that way in a good way. But I felt like it today, and it actually was a great class. I was ON today, with my head. I wanted to push myself and actually caught myself smiling half way through spin. I started telling myself “The pain(good pain not like injury pain) in your legs is only physical, break free from that.” And I did, and suddenly, it wasn’t so hard and I could go faster and stronger.
Anyways this has turned into quite the novel so sorry about that, I guess I just have a lot to ramble about today. Will try to post tomorrow, but i am going to a pool party, so we shall see. Have a happy 4th of July!!!