Moving on all fronts

All the off-again, on-again stress of the last few weeks wasn't really all that helpful for maintaining any semblance of a regular training routine.  So we decided to kick start with something neither of us had ever done before....Yoga.

It's one of those things we've talked about forever but never actually motivated to make happen.  There were concerns about not being good enough, sucking, classmates and instructors laughing at us, etc. (in the preverbal nutshell--we were both very self-conscious.)

We tracked down Lyfe--a studio in walking distance from the house that had a few beginner classes each week and headed over there--yoga matts in hand.  It was certainly a little strange at first, but the instructor spoke to us before class and new we were green.  Once the class started, there were only two other women, the instructor, Liz, and I.  Not too bad at all.  We worked our way through all the basics.  Forms were corrected often, but I think we "got it" by the end of our session.  My only problem was my sweaty hands were sliding all over the matt for 'downward facing dog'.   Our instructor, Theresa suggested a microfiber towel.  I picked one up a few days later and low-and-behold no longer had the issue for week two.

We wrapped up the session with about ten minutes of meditation.  I'm not very skilled in techniques for successful meditation, but the quiet time was all I needed to decompress and release the stress.   Walking out, we were both sweaty and sore...and both excited about returning again.

We tried a different instructor, Michele, for session 2.  She focused a bit more on flow over form--which was nice because they're equally important.  I'm glad we had a minor form background going in.


I could see myself continuing to take classes with either one.   Going to try and keep this up weekly for a few months and maybe bump it up to twice/week if it's proving as helpful as I think.

In either case, stress coping and breathing skills learned from Yoga will be key to our success moving forward.  Core strengthening is a very impressive bonus.

Liz and I both plan muscle strength training and cardio (I bike, she takes classes) beyond the yoga.  We're getting ourselves into a pretty damn nice groove.

Long hike planned for this Saturday...not sure where exactly we'll end up quite yet, but it'll be challenging once again.  And I think we'll do just fine.  I couldn't make it last weekend, so liz took a solo Temescal Canyon run (something she'd never done before)   It's easy for fear to cripple an effort to accomplish a task that may involve unpredictable panic.  I think we're past that.  We're both very excited about our trek on Saturday.  More reports to come.

OH...and we bought hiking socks!  No blisters.....I hope!  Better be no blisters for twenty bucks per pair.