I woke up this morning to a tweet from Rachel Cosgrove, and was giddy. How cool is it that we live in such a connected age that when I mention that I got sore doing a famous and highly sought after trainer’s program, she wrote back to me with this advice:
Seriously, how cool is that?! I love Twitter/the internet.
But beyond the coolness of it, it’s very sage advice. While there are times when you need to stop being a baby and push through the pain, the fact that I’m still pretty sore today (though better than yesterday) is a sign from my body that I need to ease up. So many people follow a schedule blindly, but this is part of what I like best about mixing it up and not following a specific plan: I’m not tempted to push through and risk hurting myself.
So last night’s “workout”? Nothing more than a 1 mile stroll down the main street in Charlottesville while gabbing with my mom on the phone. Then going home and following it up with some Japanese takeout that I picked specifically to be high protein: sunomono (octopus + cucumber + vinegar dressing), steamed veggies with tofu, and a salmon sushi roll sans rice. Plus a ton of water, plus a ton of sleep (9 hours! Unheard of for me during the work week).
I thought I might get up early and be fine for my next weight lifting workout this morning, but I was still sore. And that’s okay. Hey, it just means I worked out really, really, really hard on Monday! Tonight I’m going to kick the intensity up just a bit from last night – maybe a 2 mile walk, maybe 30 minutes of really easy stationary biking with a good book in hand – but I’m not going to stress about doing much more. 100 pushups? Out the window. But my shoulder/chest muscles aren’t going to wither away and turn to fat in a couple days. (Actually, they will never “turn to fat” – myth busted!).
So tonight, I’m not going to stress myself out trying to figure out how to set my laptop up next to the tiny hotel pool so I can amuse myself watching a DVD while I tread water for 2.5 hours to burn some calories in a low impact way (though I’m not going to lie, I considered it). My body says rest, and that’s what I’m going to do…
…at least until Saturday’s free Equinox 30/60/90 class. Come on, NYC readers; who else is coming? 🙂