Now that my exercise has become a consistent routine of running and yoga 5 days a week, I realize that it is difficult to write a motivational post on the topic. Therefore, friend and author Shantel Brunton has kindly written an article about her working out experience. It is a very different perspective than mine, probably more balanced. I hope you enjoy it.
Warning: there are links provided to websites for workouts that require payment. I do not make any money from the links nor have I tried the workouts. However, Shantel is very enthusiastic about them.
Working Out from Home:
In these current times with the pandemic and the many lockdowns, it can be exceedingly difficult if not next to impossible to get into the gym to work out. There are so many benefits associated with fitness that range from mental to physical. Some of these include better mood, improved sleep, reduced risk of heart disease, managing weight, and lower blood pressure just to name a few.
When I started working out, I went to the gym at my university and I started weight training. I was really nervous at first, but I soon got into it. I had my usual fears about people judging me or thinking I wasn’t good enough. However, the other people at the gym had no interest in negatively judging me and were much more focused on their own workouts.
When I went home for the summer, I was staying with my mom in a small town. Suddenly, there was no gym access for me, and I was feeling pretty upset about all of that. This occurred in 2018. It was when I began looking into more at home fitness options.
I was pretty interested in building muscle, and I’d been looking at Bodybuilding.com. I’d already been using some of their plans and workout splits for when I went to the actual gym.
Bodybuilding.com has a lot of fantastic programs on it but Hannah Eden’s Find Your Reason has to be one of the best that I’ve tried. It motivates me, challenges me, and I feel like I’m going to die every time I do it, but if you’re reading this right now, I’m not dead. I pick my tired aching body up off the floor and just keep coming back for more.
This is the program which has helped me to make a change both physically and mentally. I was able to lose a good deal of weight and get myself into a healthy range. As someone who has struggled with mental health for a long time, I found the intense physical activity really helped to manage symptoms of both depression and anxiety.
Ironically enough, I did feel more anxiety at the very start of my fitness journey because I was worried that I just wasn’t good enough physically. I wasn’t a very athletic or sporty person when I started. It doesn’t matter where you’re at in your fitness journey, there is something here for you. Along with Hannah, there are two other trainers who you can follow. The first is Tanner and he does everything for the beginner level. The second is Paulo who does the intermediate, and Hannah does the advanced.
Then all you need for equipment are two pairs of dumbbells one heavy and one light, some kettlebells preferably one heavy and one light, or you might need two of the same weight kettlebells for some exercises, a resistance band, mat, and a med ball.
That’s it, and you don’t need much space to do this either. I’ve done it in my living room, bedroom, kitchen, and now when I do it, I have my workout parties in the basement. It decreases my risk of dropping a heavy kettlebell on the floor and severely damaging the floor. Another plus is no one can hear me screaming because I like to make a lot of noise. Emotion is so powerful and it really helps a person get through the workout. This is another plus of working out at home. You can make all the noise you want.
The workout split is as follows. Three days on, one day off, then two days on and one day off.
This is great. I get Thursdays and Sundays to myself to recover, make some healthy food, meditate, and get ready for the next battle.
Monday is called Monster Monday. Some people are weird and don’t like Mondays. Well, I love Mondays because everyone always thinks they’re bad, so they turn out to be good. Monday is the day to get the ball rolling and Monster Monday will give you a huge push. There are intervals
30 seconds on 10 seconds off, 60 seconds on 20 seconds off, then finally 90 seconds on for 30 seconds of rest. I feel like these intervals are like the ghosts of Christmas coming to get ebenezer scrooge, and now I know just how terrified he was. I don’t know if that makes any sense but when I get to that 90 second interval, I feel like the ghost of my future is staring at me all creepily pointing off to something in the distance.
Tuesday- See here’s the thing I skipped Monday as a concept, Monday doesn’t really exist in my world (Don’t worry I still did the monster Monday workout) but then that psychological nonsense of Monday not being good transfers on over to Tuesday. Tuesday is Tabata, which is 20 seconds of hard work for 10 seconds of rest. It seems short and it really is. Those 20 second intervals go by fast and you learn you can do almost anything for only 20 seconds.
Wednesday= workout Wednesday and the exercise interval goes on four 45 seconds with 15 seconds of rest. There is always a tailgate, which is some crazy exercise before the workout for the day actually starts. Or there is an afterparty where you get to train abs. Because who doesn’t want nice abs. Abs are actually one of my favourite things to train, and I also really enjoy this because it is easy to train abs without having to use any fancy equipment. All you need is your beautiful body.
Thursday is a rest day.
Friday is an open format where there is no set interval, and really anything can happen. The body gets confused, then the mind gets confused, but if you can control that mental confusion and keep pushing, then great things happen.
Saturday is cool because it’s a combination of things including Tabata, 45’s and oh man the ghosts of monster Monday come back to haunt you.
Sunday is a rest day.
The workout program is really outstanding as a whole because something different is thrown at you every day, and there is no stopping your progress with this program. If you want it to be harder then you can make it harder by moving faster or lifting heavier weights. If the difficulty gets to be too much then you can always use lighter weights or just go bodyweight. It’s really not too difficult to find that intensity when you want it.
After FYR 1.0 Hannah and the gang created a separate follow-up program called FYR 2.0. This program follows the same workout split but it goes for two months rather than one month. This gives you even more time and more opportunities to improve upon yourself and really get the hang of the workouts.
I think there are so many great positives that come from working out at home. These include
You have your privacy
You don’t have to wait for equipment everything is all yours
You really don’t need too much equipment
It’s really flexible. There’s no need to make an appointment at the gym. You can work at your own pace.
To sum all of this up working out at home is one of my favourite things, and I hope it can become something you will really enjoy as well. Thank you so much for reading. Stay safe, happy and healthy,
#fitness #fitnessmotivation #workout #workoutmotivation #fitnessandmentalhealth @shantelbrunton