What fitness taught me besides being fit.
Whatever I am into, I am obsessed with. I jump head first down every rabbit hole I come across. My husband always reminds me that I am usually a part of a fringe group – the exception, not the rule. This is exactly what happened when I got into fitness. I didn’t just start working out, I dove into the online fitness community. I followed fitness accounts on social media and read fitness blogs. I surrounded myself with the fitness lifestyle. I joined a Facebook community devoted to health and fitness. Because of this, fitness started to affect other areas of my life.
Nutrition
I feel like this should be obvious. Usually someone who is taking the time to workout is going to focus on eating healthy.
Usually.
But not always. Before really diving into a fitness community, I thought that because I was working out, or running, or playing soccer I could eat what ever I wanted and still see improvements to my performance. It was the mindset of, “I’ll work it off in the gym later.”
Unfortunately, that’s not true.
It is true that losing weight is about creating a calorie deficit, meaning you just have to burn more than you eat. If losing weight is your only goal, it does not really matter where those calories come from. If you eat 1200 calories in doughnuts but burn 1500 calories a day, you are going to lose weight.
But, if you want to see improvements to your running time or if you want to gain muscle mass or tone up, how you fuel your body is so much more important! No matter how many crunches, squats, or pushups you do in a day, or how many Pinterest workouts you save, if your nutrition is not what it needs to be, you will not see the results you want. You cannot out work a bad diet.
Proper nutrition is really only something I learned since immersing myself in the online fitness community. I learned about things like quinoa and hummus and what a superfood was and what part carbs play in your diet. I learned that corn and potatoes are not vegetables, they are starches. I always assume the whole world knows what I know, and that I am always the last to hop on a new thing, but now I see that is not the case. It may seems like everyone I am around knows these things but, as my husband reminds me, I am immersed in a fringe group that is the health and fitness world!
Trusting my Body
When I began working out, I started an Instagram account solely devoted to my fitness. I have since taken it down, so please do not go looking for it. I used it to track my progress, to find inspiration, and to follow other girls who were doing and wanting the same things. In that time, I came across a phrase that I had never heard before.
“Listen to your body”
Meaning, if your body is telling you it needs rest, rest it. If you body is begging you for food or water, give it to it! If you body is telling you something is wrong, listen. But also, if your body is telling you that you can push harder, push! Of course, I could use this argument to say that my body is always asking for a muffin… but I won’t.
Somewhere between learning how to treat my body with respect and watching it grow and change and feeling pride in what it could do, I stumbled upon the idea of natural birth.
It certainly was not a new idea, but it was not something I had thought of for myself before getting into health and fitness. Maybe because I was also just getting in to the idea of starting a family, but whatever. I had been trusting my body, listening to it, loving it, for so long that I simply could not justify taking away the ONE task that it was actually created to do and suddenly doubting it. Like, “Hey Body, I know you taught yourself to do 30 pushups and to run a six minute mile but, um well, you are gonna have to sit childbirth out and let the doctors take over.” No way! It was just another physical challenge that I wanted, that I NEEDED to trust my body with.
The Crunchy Mom community
Remember what I said about the rabbit holes? This was another one. Once I looked into natural birth, I found cloth diapers, delayed cord clamping, empowered prenatal and postpartum care, breastfeeding, baby-led weaning, minimalism – the list goes on and on. All of those things just seemed to align with each other and it all started with wanting to take better care of my body. Yes, some times it is easier just to do what is mainstream and while a lot of these things are becoming more and more mainstream, (I’m looking at you, baby wearing!) most of them are very much contained within a fringe group that I happened upon. Very quickly I started to learn that I was up for the challenge! I needed to give my whole life an overhaul if I wanted to be a happier, healthier me.
Health in other areas of my life
Being physically fit and focusing on what I put in to my body made me much more aware of other things I put on or in my body like my makeup, my hair care products, and my tampons! So many of those beauty products are full of harsh chemicals and synthetic materials that we aren’t even aware of! I am not educated enough about it to call myself an advocate for it or even lecture about what you should stay away from, but if you are taking the time and energy to improve your health in one area, why not audit all areas of your life and really think about the full spectrum of health?
I switched to sulfate free shampoos and stopped washing my hair every day. This lead me to discover the Curly Girl Method and to love my natural texture.
I traded my tampons for a menstrual cup to avoid risk of Toxic Shock Syndrome and other unpleasantries, and it made my periods lighter and easier. It also eliminated embarrassing trips to the store for a last minute box of tampon.
I swore off harsh cleaning supplies and instead, I use vinegar for most things and bleach when necessary you know, like potty training a boy.
This Green Mommy Evolution that I had started led me to evaluate my entire kitchen and try to make it more green! I am not usually an environmentalist, but it just felt right. We stopped using all paper products in the kitchen and use towels, rags, and cloth napkins instead. I try to avoid single use and single serving products to cut down on the waste our kitchen produces. We compost and we recycle. We are even starting to grow our own veggies. Forget Semi-crunchy, I’m about to go fully crunchy mom over here.
Something about being physically healthy made me want to make these changes!
Loving Myself
This might be the most important thing that fitness has taught and continues to teach me. While I might have started working out because my pants were too tight and my stomach wasn’t flat anymore, I found out that it is so much easier to workout out of love instead of hate. I want a flat stomach, yes, but more than that I want to have energy to chase my son. I want to sleep well and have less bloating. I want to honor the body that I was given and keep it in top functioning shape. So now, I workout because I love myself and because my body deserves to be treated well instead of working out to fix my flaws.
I have more confidence and self love now than ever before, and it is all because the small corner of the online fitness community that I have stumbled upon is revolutionizing fitness. It’s no longer about being a size 2 or having a thigh gap. It’s about being comfortable in the skin you are in! It’s about being healthy and that looks different for everyone. Even if your goal is to lose weight, approaching that from a positive mindset full of love is healthier than one full of loathing. If you’re not approaching health, fitness, and weight loss this way, you’re doing it wrong.
Loving Others
Or, at least having more grace when dealing with others. If I am pouring so much time and energy into myself, I rarely find any left over to judge, hate on, and nit pick others. I don’t have time for that! I’m way too busy! I am also realizing that if I am truly happy and in love with myself and my life, I don’t NEED to be looking at anyone else’s. It doesn’t serve me to compare myself to her or to think ugly thoughts about her. That just serves to kill my own joy.
I know how hard it can be to love yourself, but if I am putting in all this extra work, time and energy to be my best self, why shouldn’t I assume everyone else is doing the same? Maybe they are making choices that I would never make for myself, but I have to stop and consider the fact that she might be making what she believes is the best choice for herself and her family. Or maybe she is just under educated on the matter. Or maybe she does not find value in the things I find value in. None of those reasons is reason enough to push negative vibes her way. Besides, as my three year old likes to say, “She’s not my business.”
I guess you could say that fitness touched my life in more way than one.
XO Beka
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