My Journey With Health And Fitness – Growing Strength And Confidence

Ok, this atmospheric river needs to end. Monday I went out for my usual morning walk after which I meet my seniors’ walking group for coffee before going out on our group walk. Let me tell you, it was wet. Even the sidewalks and pathways through the parks were covered with giant puddles meaning you had to walk through them and get your feet soaked. I pulled off my 2 hour walk but was miserable when I finished not because of the rain but because it was barely above freezing. I had a coffee with the group and then announced I was going home because I couldn’t stop shivering. That was understandable because I was soaked through layers of clothing and my shoes. While I did manage a run in a slight drizzle Tuesday, Monday was the last time I have been out in the rain this week and I am ok with that.

These past couple weeks I have been follwing a group of people on X that promote positive encouragement around running and strength training. It has been very uplifting and it is motivating to me. I don’t care about the ones that tell you that you need to be a super fast long distance runner in order to call yourself a runner or the ones that advocate for lifting extreme weights. Rather, I read the ones that try and lift your fitnes experience up and help you move forward.

And so in my last 9 classes I have started to grow confidence. I realized that I don’t need to do 55lb bench presses, this week it has all been 65lb. Regardless of the exercise if it isn’t challenging me I am adding on more weights. Even today doing back squats (have I mentioned how much I actually hate back squats?) I started out at 55lbs and after round 1 I added more weight without convincing myself I would lower the number of reps. Funny, it didn’t kill me. Even doing pendlay rows I only lifted 1 light round and kept upping my game until it was tough to do.

I have also started to silence the voices in my head telling me I need lighter dumbells for presses and snatches. Now, instead of waiting for the instructor to suggest I up my weights, I start higher than what I was doing and try on the last round to push myself to the max. Funny, I haven’t died yet from grabbing heavier weights so apparently it isn’t that big a risk.

That group on X has really helped me to finally break through the barriers that I thought were stopping me from improving. The only thing stopping me was my own confidence including those voices telling me things would be too difficult to do. Instead, I am not just growing confidence, I am growing strength.