On the elliptical this morning (at the God awful early hour of 4:00am), I was flipping through the November/December issue of Fitness magazine. Now I can’t exactly read on the elliptical but my eye definitely catches a few choice comments throughout the magazine. And when I stumbled upon this quote, I nearly fell off the elliptical (with laughter):
“Sneak in a workout as you stand in line at the mall or the grocery store. I do squats, while I’m waiting. Who cares if people look at you as if you’re silly?”- Ali Vincent , season 5 Biggest Loser
I just wanted to give Ali a huge hug and tell her that doing squats while waiting in line at the grocery is crazy. Now I believe that humans have become entirely too sedentary even when working out several days a week especially those of us working office jobs. So parking father away, taking short walking breaks, and climbing the stairs are great activities for keeping you moving during the day. However doing squats while waiting in line at the store crosses the line between healthy and obsessive.
After I lost 80lbs in college, I became paranoid that I would gain all the weight back. So I started little behaviors like skipping dinner on days I planned on drinking or walking the 2-3 miles to all the bars in downtown Blacksburg. And that behavior spiraled out of controlled until I developed a full blown eating disorder when I graduated from college. Just like Ali, I had been fat and now I was thin, and I was prepared to do everything I could to keep myself from gaining weight. Well, fast forward to 2011 and I’m close to the weight I had been when I had first lost the weight back in college. After years of obsessive behaviors, (starving, bingeing, over exercising, sleeping nonstop) I can finally recognize that my “healthy” behaviors were unhealthy and I had set myself up for failure. My nonstop obsession of maintaining my weight loss created the ideal situation to regain all that weight because you can’t maintain that level of obsession for years. Eventually your body rebels and suddenly you’ve gained back all that weight plus/minus ten pounds. And doing squats at the grocery store is obsessive and unhealthy: you do not have to workout 24/7 to be healthy. Eat a Christmas cookie (or two not ten). Take the stairs not the elevator. Toast the season with champagne. Shape your derriere with squats…but keep it in the gym.
On the elliptical this morning (at the God awful early hour of 4:00am), I was flipping through the November/December issue of Fitness magazine. Now I can’t exactly read on the elliptical but my eye definitely catches a few choice comments throughout the magazine. And when I stumbled upon this quote, I nearly fell off the elliptical (with laughter):
“Sneak in a workout as you stand in line at the mall or the grocery store. I do squats, while I’m waiting. Who cares if people look at you as if you’re silly?” - Ali Vincent , season 5 Biggest Loser