It’s easy for me to make excuses not to exercise. As someone who deals with chronic pain and fatigue, simply getting out of bed can sometimes be a struggle. On a day like that, the last thing I want to do is exert myself!

But I know I should. Even for people with health problems, gentle exercise can be very therapeutic. It can ease pain, help boost  energy, and lift mood. If I overdo it, sure, the soreness is so bad I probably won’t be able to work out again for a week, but that’s part of knowing my boundaries. If I stay inside my body’s limits, regular exercise can make me feel much better in both the short and long term.

We already know how good it is for us. The problem, no matter what level of health you usually experience, is renewing your commitment day after day and actually starting that workout.

Dr. Mike Evans recently released this excellent video that discusses physical benefits of exercise. It is well worth watching if you have ten minutes to spare. The way he frames finding time to exercise daily is very refreshing, and cuts through the excuses: Can you limit your sitting and sleeping to just 23 and a half hours a day?

Well, can you?

Years ago, in a simpler time when my joints were happier and my energy much less exhaustible, I began practicing kung fu. My goals were very concrete: I wanted to get into the best shape of my life, learn to protect myself should the need arise, and, above all, to look like a character from a kung fu movie while doing both these things. I wanted the moves, the great hair, and eventually the flowing robes and flying skills.

With these priorities, it shouldn’t be too surprising that the meditations we did at the beginning of every class didn’t interest me much. I tried, I truly did: I sat still with everyone else, trying to focus on being, you know, meditative. Serene. I didn’t even fidget… much. But my mind was always scurrying around, getting into things. I’d think about the oil change I had to remember to get later that day, then wonder what was going on right that second in the Bermuda Triangle. Then I’d think how nice it would be if I could fidget more. In short, I was terrible at meditating, which frustrated me, which made me want to do it even less. After months of meditation failure, I basically considered it a waste of time. I was just going through the motions until I could start working on my kicking skills again. Kicking looks cooler and burns a lot more calories.

But according to my instructors, meditation was supposed to be an integral part of kung fu. This is a martial art that was developed by monks, after all. We didn’t just meditate every class, students would have to meditate for a set amount of time as part of their “belt tests”, to advance to higher levels. Before getting your black belt, for instance, you had to sit completely still for an entire hour. If you moved, you failed. All that this made me realize was that I was never getting a black belt.

But now, years later and without any particular “shoulds” or “supposed to” involved, I’ve started to become interested in meditation. I’m not even sure why, but suddenly and out of the blue one day it seemed like a good idea. It wasn’t because I wanted to reap the clinically proven health benefits, or the (admittedly true) fact that I need to learn how to focus better, or any other logical reason. For the first time in my life, it has just felt right. Maybe deep down I know that it’s finally time for me to get to know myself better. Maybe it’s something else. But it’s different now. Now I want to meditate for me.

Child of the information age that I am, I went straight to the internet to find youtube videos and websites to give me tips on how to do it right. Remembering back on my previous attempts I knew I could use all the help I could get, even with my new motivation. I decided to start with one of the simplest methods I could find: consciously relaxing, then counting down from one hundred to zero and intending to be in a meditative state when I hit the bottom.

This was about a week ago, and I’ve been practicing every day. So far I’m still not good at meditation. Sometimes I lose count and have to start over. My thoughts still wander to the mundane and the ridiculous every time, but I’m getting better at acknowledging them and sending them on their way. I think that’s a good beginning. I guess this just proves that we can never grow until we’re truly ready to do it for ourselves.

Do you meditate? If so, what do you feel it does for you? And, the all-important question: Do you have any tips for a newbie?

Excitedly I arrived at yoga teacher school extra early for my first day.  My teacher is someone that I respect and consider a friend. I feel totally honored to be taking this journey with her at the helm of my ship.  There are 11 soon to be yoga teachers sharing this experience. Though we are together, each persons path is truly solitary. This morning we were fully immersed in challenging asanas. In the mid afternoon our minds were stimulated with a yoga discourse on the history and types of yoga……

Ellyn Gray works at Irene’s Myomassology Institute, she is a graduate of Irene’s, a Reiki Master Practitioner, and currently in school to become a yoga teacher.   You can follow her experience by clicking the link below.  Subscribe to her blog to get regular updates.

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