Ever since the Coronavirus hit back in March, I have been trying to make use of my extra time. For my first 30 days, I tracked every movie, album, exercise and TV show I indulged in. Then in April, I went on a run every single day. During the month of May I decided to set some time aside to get more flexible and try to clear my mind. The way I went about this was to do yoga daily. I have done CorePower yoga with Rachel a bunch of times in Chicago (usually YogaSculpt classes and sometimes a C2 flow). I have done P90x Yoga in the past and also had a few sessions led by Rachel and our friend Torie. While I enjoy yoga when I do it, I have never been consistent in practicing.
I found an awesome 30 day journey through a YouTuber named Yoga With Adriene. She does a great job walking you through every single exercise of each day. She is super helpful, calm and informative and has an endless catalog of videos. Even her yoga dog Benji is along for the ride, who is the most chill dog I’ve ever seen by the way. What a good pup. Scroll down to find the 30-day playlist, a few of my favorite days, and my takeaways from doing yoga for 31 straight days.
Day 1 - Recognize - Start off by recognizing your practice and self. What is this journey to you? While many people do yoga for the spiritual/mental journey, the journey to me was a way to consistently stretch and get away from what was happening in the world. The first day is a little bit longer than the others as there are some introductory steps. This is a youtube playlist so all the days will play in order or appear on the sidebar.
Day 6 - Ignite - This day was more of a core workout, but still included some stretching. Love the way this practice mixes the days up so you never feel like you are doing the same thing over and over again.
Day 12 - Nurture - This is an example of one of the days I struggled with because it was not active. It involved a lot of stretching, which was good, but also a lot of sitting up, sitting still, and clearing your mind. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy these days, it’s that I wasn’t very good at it.
Day 24 - Uplift - This was probably my favorite day of practice. Not only was it a shorter session, only 16 minutes, but this was the flow that has had the longest lasting impact for me. I will still do this flow weekly to get a stretch in. If you can only do one of the 30 days, try this one!
Day 30 - Journey - Finish this journey by reflecting back on the past 30 days and taking away some positives. No instruction or leading words on this day. The flow is up to you, feel the journey. Adriene ends the practice with this quote from John O’Donahue:
“Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plentitude opening before you.”
So I did it! All 30 (technically 31, I redid one of my favorite days for May 31st) days of yoga in a row. Each session was usually between 20 and 30 minutes. Here are some of the benefits and struggles I found throughout my practice.
My Benefits of Yoga:
Flexibility - I don’t spend time stretching like I probably should, so this was a great way to stretch and get more flexible. Particularly for me, I found that although it was slowly happening, my flexibility was increasing throughout, especially in my hips. I have always had tight hips and holding these new yoga poses was really opening me up.
Building Strength - Yoga allowed me to work on different muscle groups that I normally would not use. Building up strength throughout the entire body and feeling stronger from the core outward was a surprising addition. I always felt revived and stronger after each day.
Relaxing and Stress Relieving - It was enjoyable to step on to the mat and forget about everything else going on in the world. A time to focus on myself and really not have to think. Doing yoga was usually relaxing and cleared the mind. Although to start, holding some of the new poses was tough and not that relaxing, as I got comfortable doing them it became very soothing. I always finished the yoga session feeling relaxed and free of stress.
My Struggles with Yoga:
Inconsistency - For me, I never found a “good time” to do yoga. Sometimes I would do it in the morning, other times mid-day, but often I ended up doing it at 11:30p at night before bed. Doing it before bed was actually nice and relaxing, but often felt forced. I think building your practice into a consistent part of your day will greatly help with routine and make it easier to complete. Make it a ritual.
Focus - Sitting still and “meditating” was tough for me. I have never been a sit down and relax person, so the portion of each practice where you sit, trying not to think of all the things going on in the world, and meditate was difficult. My mind was almost always wandering. Finding that inner-zen is something that is tough, but I will continue to work on.
Lack of enthusiasm - Some days I just didn’t want to do yoga. Which is probably why I ended up with 11:30pm sessions more often than not. I feel like this is not directly related to yoga, but the challenge with doing something every single day. Some days you just do not want to and almost need to force yourself into doing it. I am glad I did though, because like I said earlier, I always felt satisfied after doing my yoga. Sometimes getting yourself to start is the hardest part. Building that consistency and routine is very important into any healthy changes in life.
And that concludes my May Yoga journey. I hope to continue with my yoga practice at least a few times a week into the future. Ideally it will be every day, but we shall see what happens. I plan to explore different Yoga classes and teachers in the future to mix it up. I highly recommend Yoga With Adriene if you want to try out a 30 day journey. She has a few different 30-day versions, all for free on YouTube.
Staying in the fitness realm, on top of the Yoga, I also completed 100 pushups, crunches and squats every day in May. My goal is to hit 20k of each by the end of 2020. I never did the same number of sets/reps 2 days in a row during May. Here is the breakdown of my workouts.
May (Pushups, Crunches, Squats)
May 1 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 2 - 100 - 2 sets of 50
May 3 - 200 - 8 sets of 25
May 4 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 5 - 100 - 5 sets of 20
May 6 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 7 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 8 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 9 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 10 - 100 - 2 sets of 50
May 11 - 100 - 5 sets of 20
May 12 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 13 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 14 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 15 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 16 - 100 - 2 sets of 50
May 17 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 18 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 19 - 100 - 10 sets of 10
May 20 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 21 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 22 - 200 - 10 sets of 20
May 23 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 24 - 100 - 2 sets of 50
May 25 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 26 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 27 - 100 - 5 sets of 20
May 28 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
May 29 - 100 - 3 sets of 33 1/3
May 30 - 100 - 5 sets of 20
May 31 - 100 - 4 sets of 25
I also ended up running 150 miles in May, but that is for another blog. Fitness for me has been a pleasant surprise during quarantine and I hope that I can keep it up for the long run. It feels good to be in shape and be healthy. The extra time I have allocated to it has been wonderful. This is the best shape I have been in since being a college athlete nearly a decade ago.
I am going to shake things up for next month as far as a “daily challenge”. Stay tuned for the June blog about how I watch TV every single day.
Now get out there and try some yoga!
Josh