You know exercise? That beautiful melody with such peaceful music to it. Said no one ever in this world. Is such a pain, it’s nerve wrecking to our muscles, yet promises a booty of steel.

Why do we do it? Some of the benefits beyond a booty of steel can be for example, that sense of discipline that exercise instills in us. Of course there is some days when we feel like the king or queen of the jungle, we are so energized, we crave movement and we want to be so sweaty, we even bring in the . . . “BURPEES”! If you have done them, you know they are hell. If you haven’t, spoiler alert you are going to have a blast, trying to breathe while doing them.

So we have those days, one every few full moons, and then we have the rest of life, all those days when we don’t feel like it. We are just plain tired and uninspired some would say, then that discipline that says you do it regardless of your feelings kicks in and you get your cute lazy butt to the mat or the gym , or the hills, whatever is your happy place and you do it. And is hard but we do it, we feel good. Maybe we are not as sweaty but we sure feel great about showing up and doing our best.

Inspiration can be a shitty friend

When you are writing, is kind of a similar deal. Bare with me to elaborate. There are some days where we feel we have so much to be said or written! We feel the wind in our face and it tells us: “Go to your laptop start typing”, and we smile and start typing, and we are saying things and then more things, and then we have so much to say that our fingers don’t keep up with our minds (as fun as it sounds) Other days, zero inspiration, zero ideas, even our fingers feel lazy! I know this may sound silly, but picture your fingers reluctantly refusing to move just laying there, trying to just take in some sun. And similar to exercise, we don’t do it because tomorrow we will look so lean, and our abs of steel will  be shinning, we do it because we look ahead. You see the future, the outcome of what exercise will bring you.

We know if you continue to do it as the days and months pass, results will come. We get stronger, before we even see any results, we see it in our mood. We feel good about doing it, we feel refreshed and we know the more we do it, the better we will be at it. With writing inspiration feels great, but is not a good concrete floor for us to stand on. If we write only when inspired then, we might as well just write on people’s birthdays. Our writing muscle can’t become stronger and more skilled if is only use on occasions. So we look ahead, we write because it help us become better at it and like exercise eventually we will achieve hard, shinny abs of steel, metaphorically speaking of course, probably easier to get muscles for writing that those inside my tummy.

Exercise requieres focus, it shows us how to be present.

The best workouts we have are those involving us being super present, not thinking of what we are wearing later to a dinner or what kind of yum yum shake am I having with breakfast, present in the moment. Only thinking of the movement we are making, the muscles we are engaging in this exercise and to breath through it. Yoga requieres for us to focus on our breathing when some positions just make our body hurt so much, it helps us to go deeper into the position we are trying to achieve. Writing requieres focus as well, specially when you want to be super clear about what you are writing but our minds are having a million ideas at the same time and it gets so confusing, so like with exercise, we focus, we focus on being present. Why am I writing? what do I want to say with my writing? We breath deep and breath again to relax, to focus and to put all those ideas and words in order. Just like with exercise, we breath, send all that clutter away and now we are doing this exercises harder, better or deeper; with writing we focus, inhale, exhale and we can write our words with way more clarity and less chaos in our voice.

When I exercise as when I write, I feel centered, less crazy

So many times a day our minds can feel so crazy, our thoughts so entangled. Is like our minds are on this “don’t you stop thinking about everything” marathon. Have you ever been a participant in this marathon, yikes! it feels never ending!

Something happens when we are so into the exercise we are doing, or so connected with the writing we are working on. We feel good, we start to feel less and less crazy, the chaos inside our brains, starts to have some order, as we move thoughts away, we make space for the present, for what we are doing at this precise moment. Is magic, is calming. Not sure if it is the focus and the breathing, but when writing, I feel calm, peaceful. Seriously not thinking of other things except what am I writing. It feels good to breath peace and exhale peace. I know it won’t last all day but right now is with me. So damn similar to when we exercise. For that time is us, us and our body, our breathing, our perseverance, the discipline of showing up regardless of feelings, our capacity to mute all the noise outside and just be us.

Just like when are so out of breath, our hearts are pounding like maniacs, we are so sweaty and hot, and then we feel fresh air and it feels amazing! we enjoy it so much. We breath it in and this air fills our lungs with energy to do more, to do better.

With writing, breathing and focusing feel so amazing! Because now we are more able to put into clear and in a more organized matter, all the words and thoughts inside our minds. Our words now will show up in our screen, shinning, clear, ready to go out.

Exercise and writing, definitely daughters from this same Mother Earth!