Not Your Mama's Yoga

Five AM came pretty quick this morning, but to no avail I did get up, and put the DVD in the player and started my workout.  Imagine my shock when the timer on the TV started counting back from 1 hour and 32 minutes.  Of course I said, ok a lot of slow moving stretching so it just will be a bit little longer.    YEAH!! RIGHT!!  Let’s call it slow moving, stretching, balancing, strength conditioning torture.  I think this was the hardest workout of them all.

I knew I was out of shape, hence the reason to start the program in the first place, but this kicked my ever-loving ass.  Mentally, I felt like I was about an inch tall, but to be honest, physically I felt pretty good.  Limber, energized, centered.  There is something to say for this Yoga thing.  I have been through yoga classes before and they were hard, but they were a half hour long.  This was a pure 90 minutes of totally engaged muscles.  It is going to be a while before I can say that I enjoy it, but somewhere down the line, of course saying that I do not give up, I think I might like it. 

I was a dancer for quite a while, so I am used to getting razzed for taking part in something that can be perceived as demasculating.  Well, there is no way for that perception to appear for this "Yoga X" program.  If it does, then you haven't tried it.  From the warm-up to the cool down I was sweating, and my heart rate was up and I didn’t move from a 4 foot radius.

Other than that, I am still pushing along on day 5.  The diet thing is a little tougher than I remember.  Not that it is tough to eat, just as often as I like.  I just dive in to work so intensely I actually forget to eat.  I ended up, putting reminders on my calendar at work so a window pups up every 2-3 hours and says "EAT!!:.  Isn't that funny?  Next thing you know I am going to be doing the same thing to remind myself to go to the restroom.

Did anyone watch the series of "The Biggest Loser"?  This season was amazing.  I mean I have seen some of the episodes in the past and the people on the show really make some great progress, but not memorable.  This season there was this woman, Ali, who got there with her mother and she was about 240 pounds and maybe five foot three.  Well, when she ended the show, she was around 120 pounds and she was cut and absolutely gorgeous.  The whole thing happened in 21 weeks with just diet and exercise.   It was a true testament to eating clean and working out.  I'll never even doubt the basics don't work.  I mean 21 weeks from obese to sculpted.  Incredible!!  There were 5 guys that had almost the same transformation.  Mark, Dan, Jay, Rodger and Justin.  Justin couldn't even get health insurance because he was over 350 lbs at the finale he as around 220 and ripped up.  I just think if there are people that let themselves go, but realized it and decided to make the change, that anyone can make a change for anything in their life no matter their age, sex and race.  We really do create our own destiny.

Rehearsals are going well, we have one more tonight and the benefit is on Sunday, then I continue on with Los Galinos which only rehearses a couple times a week.  If there is anything else out there that anyone is auditioning for, please let me know.  I am dying to get jump into an actual character.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Life, Health, Happiness & Success

-Brad