I’ll admit, I’m not a fan of new years resolutions for the simple reason that they don’t work. I‘ve spent a lot of my life as a yoga and fitness instructor and my classes have always been full during the month of January, only to dwindle down over the next month or two. 

Personally, I’ve been pretty good about keeping up my fitness due to my active lifestyle and preference of biking over driving, but the pandemic changed things and I hardly ever leave the house anymore, and I’m embarrassed to say my bicycle hasn’t been used in three years. (I hope the tires are ok!)

Earlier this year, I was thinking about the older people in my life who have let themselves go. I don’t mean they are overweight, but they can no longer do simple things they used to do, like sit on the floor or walk for long periods of time. I decided that it’s never too early to start planning for the future, and my curiosity is much stronger than my drive. (That’s why if I don’t set an alarm across the room, I can go down a Tiktok rabbit hole for an hour and a half, even when I have other, more important things to do. 

Long story short, instead of setting new fitness routine goals, (ie. Work out for an hour a day, five times per week), about six months ago, I started tapping into my curiosity with a pedometer and a daily fitness test. 

There are a number of step counters out there. iPhones even come with one. I use Google Fit to motivate myself to walk every day. As long as my phone is in my pocket, I can check both the number of steps, as well as the number of “health points”, which I earn by doing vigorous exercise, like walking quickly or dancing. Seeing the numbers grow is motivating and I get all the cardio I need from striving to complete the circles on the app. 

My fitness test is fun and easy. For each day of the week, I do a very simple test to see if I can still do basic, traditional exercises. For example, Mondays I do one push up, Tuesdays I do one sit up, etc. I don’t limit myself to only one of these exercises, but if it’s 9pm and I realize I haven’t yet done my daily fit test, doing one unit of one exercise is not too strenuous. (Legal disclaimer: I am not suggesting that it would be safe for others, just that it it is safe for me. Your mileage may vary). If I start my fitness test during the day, after I am warmed up from walking or other exercise, I might be motivated to see how many pushups or sit ups I can do. Then it turns into a game of whether I can do more than I did the previous week.  

Some fitness tests I do on other days are 

1 handstand

1 boat pose (V sit) for a certain number of seconds or breaths

1 cheerleader pose- where I stand on one leg and hold the other one up to the side

1 bridge pose (keeping my upper back on the ground)

and

1 sun salutation.

I plan to continue doing these daily fitness tests well into my 90s, so by that time, if Tiktok is still around and you see a video of an old lady doing twenty pushups or walking on her hands, that will be me!

Thanks for reading!
Rebecca H. Lee
Audiobook Narrator

Listen to this blog post here: https://youtu.be/hviWZuYD5GQ

Visit my website at becksvoice.com

Or Follow me on social media!

https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebecca-h-lee-audiobook-narrator/

https://www.instagram.com/beckcentric/

https://www.facebook.com/beckcentric

@beckcentric