I vowed that I could only eat pizza once a week and my french fry intake had to be limited (I could not give up the french fries...they are seriously the single most delicious item UDS has to offer. I'm not kidding). I replaced my go-to dorm snacks -peanut m&ms and oreos- with sugar snap peas and carrots. I bought Acai juice and replaced pop and milk with a liter of water a day. A group of us all met up at the rec center just about every night during the week to set up shop on the elliptical machines followed by extensive (attempted) ab work. Things were going well! I felt a lot more healthy and confident especially since I had a group of friends supporting me and vice versa.
But we had one problem....5 out of the 7 days of the week we worked hard to resist the negative and choose the positive, healthy options; but come the weekend... all bets were OFF. We would walk back to the dorms after a work out and smell Hong Kong Noodle and were all happy to pass it by... "Just wait for the weekend guys!!" We would all encourage one another. Well flash forward to Friday night. We're all dressed, looking cute at a friend's party. And where are we? Not socializing in the living room, not pouring drinks in the kitchen. Nope. We're all posted up at the snack table. Devouring sour gummy worms and eating the chips and dip like it was our job.
Basically we pigged out on the weekend. 2 days out of the week I felt free to eat ice cream or get Jimmy Johns 2 nights in a row, not to mention take in alcoholic beverages that conveniently didn't have a list of nutrition facts. Countless empty calories devoured guiltlessly. Well not completely guilt free...we would eat our hearts out so come Monday we felt totally and completely obese, so hitting the gym and eating healthily the rest of the week was more of a necessary penance than anything else. Is this the best way to get in shape? No. Is it actually counter productive? Probably. But it worked for us.
Now that the school year is over though, I find myself without workout buddies and a house where there isn't countless dinner options to choose from. Luckily for me, my dinners at home are almost always a balanced blend of nutritional and delicious so its hard to mess that up....but the gym time is more of a challenge. I'm a member at my local YMCA so I love to hit up a spin class or BodyPump whenever I feel like driving....if not, I usually just do a workout video or two at home. Which I feel is always never quite sufficient. For some reason it doesn't feel like working out if you never leave the house! But I do it anyway and cross "work out" from my daily to-do list.
I will admit though, its definitely more of a challenge to get working out when you don't have someone who's counting on you to be at the gym! So I resort to personal motivation...I guess that's a good skill to cultivate right? Whenever I need a boost of get-off-your-butt inspiration, I think back to my ballet days....yes, I did ballet, it was lovely.
I think back especially to one particular class when my classmates and I had gone en pointe. It was a Saturday class, so it was early and we were all freaking out because our normal Saturday teacher was going to be replaced for the day by the head of the school (and the company), Lise.
I loved Lise for all the same reasons my mother disliked her:1- Her name is spelled Lise, but pronounced like Lisa. Her mother's name was Loyce. Which, I thought was just fabulous.
2- She had crazy hair. You cant tell from the picture, but she had this faded orangish-red frizzy, poof of a mane that was graying at the roots. I loved that she always had it down and out when everyone else had their hair in a tightly wound bun. She had this habit of just push/hitting it back, out of her face, instead of delicately brushing it through with her fingers like the rest of the female population - like she didn't have time for it. I thought her hair was beautiful.
3- She was a little bit insane. She was always flying around like a mad woman, her hair trailing behind her, walking so fast, but always in a beautiful way. She was still clearly a dancer, she carried herself like she was not simply 'pedestrian' (something they always wanted us to do as well - "don't walk like you're just another guy on the street","you're holding yourself so 'pedestrian'). And her eyes always were wide, bug-eyed, and kind of on fire. You could never tell if she was mad or just intensely focused on something else (usually a mix of the two)
4- She was not ordinary, she was definitely different. She was the first person I encountered who was really an artist. I wanted her to notice me, and I wanted to impress her, and I never, NEVER wanted to piss her off....both of which, happened that day.....
so anyway...
We equal parts feared and loved her and we knew we had to seriously bring our A game. We were all in Junior High and so we were doing a fine job of cultivating the "prima" attitude - competitiveness mixed with grace and elegance and an added pinch of the classic bitchy junior high-girl. Well Lise must have known this because she gave us quite the speech that day. She had us in pointe shoes for the whole class, which was something we hadn't all done before. And she went around to each dancer and looked at our feet in releve. She checked the position and commented on each one
"Good turn out"
"Adjust your heel back more"
"Put more of your weight forward"
When she got to me I was nervous...but I'll never forget: she said, "You have gorgeous feet - really, a beautiful arch."
KA-CHING!
But just because she paid me a compliment didn't mean the class would be any easier. We were at the barre doing what seemed like endless releves and battements of every variety and we were all sweaty and tired and our feet were hurting like hell. Basically, it was a bitch of a class. So I guess it wasn't just ME who made her mad....because I don't remember what set her off; maybe we were being lazy, or maybe someone had given her attitude (I cant imagine who would be that stupid), but red-hair ablaze and eyes wide she clapped her hands loudly and stopped the class. We all stood at the barre giving her our utmost attention.
"How many hours a day do you spend watching TV? How many hours a day do you spend on the computer? How many hours a day do you spend sitting on your behinds? (ballet teachers NEVER said butt) And how many hours a day do you spend in class? 2 or 3 hours a day? Just to go home and lazy about? You are here, but you are not actually here. You are all young ladies now and I expect that you come to class ready and willing to be here fully and I expect that you do not waste time and I expect that you put 100% into every movement, every combination, everything you do here. You should be stretching every day! You should ask questions if you don't understand something! You must respect me, you must respect the pianist and you must respect yourself. I ask that you do your best, your very best. And if you want to succeed as a dancer, I expect nothing less from you.............................Now, lets start again on the left!"
Well. That just about made us all pee our tights and cry tears of shame and inspiration... and by god you better believe we danced our little "behinds" off for the rest of class.
So whenever I need motivation to get my butt into high-gear. I think of Lise, and about just how many HOURS I've spent on my behind.
