When I work out in the gym, I find that you are either in two categories. A weight lifter who never takes their weights off the bar, or a cardio enthusiast who spends hours on the elliptical. I am neither of these two people, or rather, I am a little of both even though I will announce to anyone that I dislike cardio with all my heart when it comes down to the treadmill and lungs.
Luckily, my running after the past semester of on and off gym attendance has gotten better, but though as I said, I am mix of both types of gym people, when I go to the gym and don't just tell myself that I will do yoga in my room and then don't, I set my stuff into a cubby and I walk into the weight lifting area.
Usually I walk into the weight lifting area as the only woman among a dozen guys.
There is nothing wrong with this. To be honest though, I find myself proud when I am the only lady in the room lifting weights and attempting to do pull ups. Maybe this is because I know that I would never actually have gotten the confidence to lift weights at all if it wasn't for my ex pushing me out of bed at 5:30 in the morning to workout when I couldn't convince him to sleep just for a few more hours.
Back then, I had to ask him for help for everything, including lifting a single bar for fear of making a fool out of myself in front of the other three people who would dare to get up that early. I had no idea what I was doing, let alone if I was squatting correctly since apparently there is a difference between yoga squatting and holding weight on your back and squatting so you don't fall over. Who knew?
In the past the only people I had seen weight lift was scary looking body builders, and my dad in the basement when he and my mom were on another health kick. Not only must I saw was I perpetually worried about looking like that girl who had not a clue what she was doing, but I also am not going to lie, I was also afraid of turning into a veined body builder when I always lusted after ballerinas or those girls in action movies who looked like they could take down a man in two seconds flat.
Yet still, my gym clothes being thrown at me every other day, I literally rolled out of bed and onto the cold tile floor, and went to the gym.
I definitely wasn't confident at all still. But then, after about a month, I began to see a difference. Not only was this difference in my perpetually skinny fat body that I had come to think as cute and petite after losing all the muscle I had previously gained in my gymnastics years. But I also saw a difference in how I carried myself each morning when we arrived. How I carried myself for the rest of the day.
I won't tell you that I love to work out. I don't. I love the feeling after I workout most of the time, but before it takes a few motivating pep-talks from myself to make a plan to go. I tell myself the terrible things like, "you want to look good, don't you?" But I also tell myself other things such as, "pretend that you are preparing for the hunger games or something and feel badass," or "you never know when there may be a zombie apocalypse that you probably won't survive!"
Only sometimes do those three things work. But when they do and I strip myself of my cute clothes I wore all day to class and change into my terrible not matching gym clothes that make me look like the bum of the gym some days, I go.
And sometimes when I lift alone or with a bunch of guys finishing up their off season sports workout, I do feel badass. And always, when I am jamming out to Spotify, if I catch the gaze of another girl I have never seen before in the mirror by the dumbbells, I smile just a little as if to say, "Hell yeah, we got this."
We are strong ladies willing to break the cardio mold...even if tomorrow I won't be able to move my legs.
Luckily, my running after the past semester of on and off gym attendance has gotten better, but though as I said, I am mix of both types of gym people, when I go to the gym and don't just tell myself that I will do yoga in my room and then don't, I set my stuff into a cubby and I walk into the weight lifting area.
Usually I walk into the weight lifting area as the only woman among a dozen guys.
There is nothing wrong with this. To be honest though, I find myself proud when I am the only lady in the room lifting weights and attempting to do pull ups. Maybe this is because I know that I would never actually have gotten the confidence to lift weights at all if it wasn't for my ex pushing me out of bed at 5:30 in the morning to workout when I couldn't convince him to sleep just for a few more hours.
Back then, I had to ask him for help for everything, including lifting a single bar for fear of making a fool out of myself in front of the other three people who would dare to get up that early. I had no idea what I was doing, let alone if I was squatting correctly since apparently there is a difference between yoga squatting and holding weight on your back and squatting so you don't fall over. Who knew?
In the past the only people I had seen weight lift was scary looking body builders, and my dad in the basement when he and my mom were on another health kick. Not only must I saw was I perpetually worried about looking like that girl who had not a clue what she was doing, but I also am not going to lie, I was also afraid of turning into a veined body builder when I always lusted after ballerinas or those girls in action movies who looked like they could take down a man in two seconds flat.
Yet still, my gym clothes being thrown at me every other day, I literally rolled out of bed and onto the cold tile floor, and went to the gym.
I definitely wasn't confident at all still. But then, after about a month, I began to see a difference. Not only was this difference in my perpetually skinny fat body that I had come to think as cute and petite after losing all the muscle I had previously gained in my gymnastics years. But I also saw a difference in how I carried myself each morning when we arrived. How I carried myself for the rest of the day.
I won't tell you that I love to work out. I don't. I love the feeling after I workout most of the time, but before it takes a few motivating pep-talks from myself to make a plan to go. I tell myself the terrible things like, "you want to look good, don't you?" But I also tell myself other things such as, "pretend that you are preparing for the hunger games or something and feel badass," or "you never know when there may be a zombie apocalypse that you probably won't survive!"
Only sometimes do those three things work. But when they do and I strip myself of my cute clothes I wore all day to class and change into my terrible not matching gym clothes that make me look like the bum of the gym some days, I go.
And sometimes when I lift alone or with a bunch of guys finishing up their off season sports workout, I do feel badass. And always, when I am jamming out to Spotify, if I catch the gaze of another girl I have never seen before in the mirror by the dumbbells, I smile just a little as if to say, "Hell yeah, we got this."
We are strong ladies willing to break the cardio mold...even if tomorrow I won't be able to move my legs.