I won't let my body out be outwait everything that I'm made, don't won't spend my life trying to change. I'm learning to love who I am. I get I'm strong, I feel free, I know every part of me. It's beautiful. And then will always out way if you feel.
It would be here, She'll some love to the food.
Why have they take you one day?
And did you and.
Die out way? Happy Saturday?
Outweigh amy here and exercise is a well known way to get endorphins. At least that was made clear to me and maybe some of you back in two thousand and one when Reese Witherspoon playing el Woods gave us this classic line and legally Blonde, she was trying to show others on the legal team that their client was innocent.
I just don't think we could have done this. Exercise gives you endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don't shoot their husbands.
That movie is totally in my wheelhouse for my age. So if you're listening right now and you're younger or older and haven't seen that movie for some reason, it's so cute and I highly recommend that you watch it. And while yes, exercise releases endorphins. It's not the only way. There are a number of other ways in which these beneficial, feel good chemicals are released naturally without exercising, and I'll
get into those in just a minute. I'm sharing this because there was a time when things were really disordered for me when it came to working out. When I first started true recovery three years ago, I had to put a halt to a lot of my working out because I really didn't know how to do it truly for the good.
Of my body.
I didn't know how to enjoy it either, because for much of my life, probably since high school and I'm forty two now, so the math working out was always tied to what I ate like either as punishment or or was tied to what I wanted to eat, So then that meant I had to earn the food. So my reasons for working out were going through my eating disorder filter. Now, to give you an idea of what that filter was like, I wouldn't skip a workout even if I was tired, or if I was sick, or
even if I was injured. I wouldn't take time off and I got anxious or I would feel guilty if I missed a workout. I was always preoccupied with weight and exercise routine. Now also lots of food and whatnot preoccupied me too, But we're talking about working out right now.
And I would exercise more.
If I ate a lot, or if I missed a workout, I would try to make up for it.
I would say things to myself like.
Oh, I ate so much last night, Better work extra hard today, or run x amount of miles. I ate too much this weekend, so I'll have to work it off this week with two A days or extra cardio. And I've been really good with what I've been eating, so I've earned this treat. Or you know, the list goes on. I had this cake, so now I've got to work out this way today.
I would eat a lot less.
If I couldn't exercise too, I would I would skip seeing friends, I would.
Give up other activities.
I would abandon responsibilities to make more time for exercise. I honestly based a lot of my self worth on the number of workouts that I did, and I was never satisfied with how much I was doing.
There was always more.
I mean, when I was in college, I signed up for a marathon, and I did so under the guys that I love to run and I wanted to challenge myself, but it was one hundred percent so that I could basically sign up for something that was going to hold me accountable to run a lot and that would equal me losing weight. I mean, I told myself for years and years years that I love to run, but I do not like running. And I know that now because I know myself better, I know I decided to finally
get serious about recovery. I had to press pause and give myself a break from exercise so that I could revisit working out through a different filter, a new filter, a filter that would be good for my body, not just for my body, my body, my mind, my spirit.
I got a mind, body soul connection.
Thing happens for me now more so than that when I'm working out. And so maybe you're in a place where you need to press pause on working out so that you can reset and work on a new filter and figure out what you like or what you don't like, and are you miserable doing this one workout when maybe
you could open yourself up to something else. And my encouragement would be that it takes time, so you got to be patient with yourself, and while you set aside your strict workouts, your rigorous workouts or whatever it is, look at that as an opportunity to maybe go on more walks, either alone or with someone a friend, your significant other, a group of girlfriends and get outside with nature. If you're alone, be with your thoughts and work through some stuff while you're on a walk, or take it
all in. It's really good to be outside, especially well, at least for me during recovery, being outside was very, very good for me. I'm still in recovery, but in the early days. Also, good conversation can be amazing if you've got someone on your walk, and then also know that you can still give your body that feel good chemical release through other things. So I did some research and compiled some ways for us to release endorphins without exercising.
So first up we got.
Massage, which I mean that's a nice replacement for working out, and also acupuncture. Both massage and acupuncture have been shown to stimulate the release of endorphins, particularly when pain trigger points are hit. Because endorphins release as a natural pain reliever. Those endorphins then lead to a sense of relaxation during and after a massage or acupuncture. Maybe you don't have time for one of those two things, but surely you
have time for some laughter. Because the verse of laughter that happens during maybe a funny TV show or a funny movie, or laughing with friends, all that might actually have more benefits than you think. There are several studies that have shown that laughter physiologically stimulates the production of beta endorphins. Now, the exact reason behind this is still up for debate, but many think that the endorphin release comes from the deep breathing and whole body motion that's
associated with laughing, so it's almost like it's stimulating an exercise. Also, UV light, being outside on a nice day has relaxing feelings associated with it, and part of it is that the UV light helps to stimulate the release of beta endorphins. Additionally, the brain releases seratonin when the body is exposed to sunlight, adding to the increase in happy hormones. There's also yoga, which yes, I know is technically working out, especially for me. It was I used to do hot yoga two days
when I was really trying to punish myself. But I'm not talking about yoga in that sense. I'm talking about the kind of yoga that you're having a mind body connection with the type of yoga that booser endorphins along with other feel good hormones, and it even can lower cortisol levels, which is the stress hormone. And yoga now that I am in a place of healing and recovery,
it is so different for me. I actually don't have any desire to go to a hot class and sweat like crazy, which if you still do in recovery, that's totally fine for me. Again, I started to realize what I like and what I don't like. And now if I do yoga from time to time, which is so crazy that now I just do it from time to time because I went almost every single day for years, again.
Sometimes twice a day.
But now that I see it as a way to slow down and have some true mind body soul connection, it's a really beautiful practice for me. That's why I'm mentioning it here as a way to release some endorphins, even though it is technically still a workout, and I'm trying to give you alternatives.
Now.
Music is our next one, and it's definitely an alternative.
Playing music is.
Another way to release endorphins a steady measured pain tolerance, and again, since endorphins are a pain reliever, and performers and found that singing, dancing, and drumming all trigger endorphin release. As far as listening to music, the data is more mixed, but some experts say that the act of listening to music can release endorphins too, while others say that more
research is needed. But I know for sure I feel super good if I put on a really good song, roll down my windows, go for a drive, and sing along to the song like that definitely boosts my mood. And listening to music for sure causes a release of dopamine, which is another chemical that improves your mood. So even if listening to music doesn't result in an endorphin release, it does result in the release of another happy hormone.
Meditation.
Some studies have shown that consistent meditation can help release endorphins. The exact reason is still unknown, but consistent meditations seem to cause higher levels of endorphins, and studies also show that meditation can be an effective tool for stress management, and that people who meditate have higher levels of serotonin, a natural chemical that the body makes to help improve
the mood. So, in other wor words, if you practice consistent meditation, you're more likely to feel some mood boosting effects for sure. And for me, I had to get over the whole woo woo side of meditation and sort of dispel some myths that I had in my mind about it. I'm actually in the middle of a meditation challenge. It's for twenty one days and I'm halfway there, and it's so good. I can say that it has caused
me to manage my stress better. I have a different vibe about me, even when things are happening to me that normally used to throw me way off or i'd get all, you know, in a fuss about I'm a little more chill about those things, not saying I still don't get worked up over much, but I feel like the meditation challenge is happening. So if you're someone that's like, oh, I don't know that I can get into that, just
look up some guided meditations on YouTube. Start small, even if you can just do you know, a few minutes, five minutes, ten minutes minor, averaging about ten minutes a day and that's perfectly fine if that's all you can do. I mean, meditation doesn't mean you have to sit for hours and hours and you're doing really anything weird, and you don't have to walk away from your.
Everyday life to do it.
I just shut my bedroom door and either sit up straight on my bed, or I sit in a chair, or sometimes I sit on the floor.
I mean, your at work, if you.
Have an office, you could shut your office door and just sit and try to focus on that time. Doesn't mean you have to like change clothes and sit on some you know, crazy little matt thing or be at a yoga class to meditate. Also another thing that pops into my mind too in the beginning is like, oh, I don't know if meditation lines up with what I believe.
And honestly, you can meditate and keep believing, you know, religion wise, faith wise, whatever whatever background you're coming from, you can meditate and keep believing in whatever or whoever you want. Also something that kept me for meditating was I have a lot of thoughts in my head all the time, and I thought, well, if I'm not able to stop all my thoughts, I'm just not going to be very good at this, so I shouldn't do it. But meditation is not, and nor will it ever be.
I don't think about trying to stop or get rid of thinking, and I'm so glad that I now know that because it's not possible. Meditation works by well, at least for me. And what I've been guided to do is like thoughts are going to pop into my head and I acknowledge them and then I release them and I get back to focusing on whatever I'm focusing on.
And I might have to do that a bajillion different times during the meditation, but that's okay as long as I'm coming back to the guided meditation every single time. And I know the more I practice this, the better I'm going to get. But it's really not a big deal. If another thought pops into my head, I just acknowledge it, send it off.
Focus, acknowledge it, send.
It off, refocus, and I guess, yeah, you just got to know that.
It's pretty simple.
It's not as hard as at least I made it out to be, and it doesn't necessarily work immediately. I heard an analogy the other day about if you wanted to learn how to play the piano, you wouldn't take one lesson and then walk away frustrated because you couldn't play a song yet on the piano. So you can't do one meditation and then walk away frustrated because you don't really feel like you got anything out of it yet. So just know that it's not going to work immediately,
but there are benefits. It's a long term process. Speaking of piano, I definitely want to take piano lessons soon. I know, random thought that just popped in my head. Two things I want to do play tennis and piano, So hopefully I will get to doing those two hobbies
at some point later this year. Well, I hope y'all are having the day that you need to have, and I hope that this helps you in case you're in a place where you're trying to figure out how exercise really fits into your life and how it's showing up for you, and to give you hope that you can have a healthy relationship with movement and exercise and it can actually feel really good and you can do things that you love and it doesn't have to be punishment.
So okay, Well, I'll se y'all Tuesday for.
The fifth thing, and then next Thursday for four things, and then next Saturday for outwigh.
That's how it all works.
Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, see you then bye