Okay so I went to the gym last night (even though I would have rather chewed my own arm off) and I managed to up my cardio to an hour instead of my usual half hour. Small victory for me, yay!
But while I was on the elliptical and the treadmill all I could think about was the people on the machines around me. They had such focus on their faces. Where does this come from? Am I just not there yet? What exactly were they thinking about? I can only assume that they are thinking about their health or their goals, I'm not sure really. I do know that nothing like that goes on in my head while I'm pedaling or walking.
For me the first half of the time is spent willing myself to go on. Come on Lenore, you can do it! And then I think I'm awesome and I inevitably make the mistake of looking down at the timer. 4 minutes. Then I spend the next little while convincing myself that my lungs won't really explode and I'm (probably) not going to die.
Then when I hit my stride there are no thoughts at all really. Not useful ones anyway. To be honest the only thing happening in my head at this point is the music video for whatever top 40 song is currently blasting through my ipod and deafening me. Sometimes I get so caught up that I actually find myself dancing slightly. Yes, that's right. This has happened to me. I find myself busting a move right there on the treadmill and then thinking "OMG there are other people here and THEY CAN SEE ME! So I pull the ever smooth move of pretending to stretch or fix my hair or something, but who am I kidding? No one.
My biggest fear is that this will happen and due to my poor physical state I won't be able to recover like I could have before and I'll be bucked from the treadmill, fly off the back and of course hit the wall behind me. That part I can handle, here's the fear part. That when someone comes to my rescue and asks me what happened, I'll be so shaken up that I won't be able to piece together a lie in my head and blame it on a seizure, a neurological disorder or a rare and unpronounceable condition, nope the truth will fly out of my mouth....My bad, I got caught up in a sudden and severe case of Bieber Fever and lost control.
What are they thinking when the others are on that treadmill? Probably something like how great do my glutes look as I'm running and not even breaking a sweat! I hate those people...
ReplyDeleteWay to go Leno...!!
I hate the gym. I have tried and tried to get into the whole cardio equipment thing but each time I give up after a month or so.
ReplyDeleteI have a few treadmill tricks though - because it's the only machine I can stand to use since I can visualize myself running on a road.
1) Get a towel or magazine and cover up the console so you can't see how long its been.
2) Make sure you have at least 5-10 great iPod running songs in a row - bad music is a bummer.
3) Use the running intervals on the treadmill to go fast and slow - one minute fast one minute slow. It passes the time soooo much faster!
But in my opinion ditch the gym and find something you enjoy doing!
At Moxham they have some TVs in front of the treadmills, and they all overlook the weight area. I typically glance up at the TV and then watch how other people use machines that I've never used and imagine that some day I will be brave enough to try them.
ReplyDeleteP.S I followed! :)
-Mark