Strength

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about strength.

This 50th year has been a year of joy at times, but also challenges. Not exactly what I had in mind in several different, surprising ways. Don’t we all want to be killing it everywhere always?

Instead of thriving in every area – in some important areas, I’m rebuilding. I’m working toward acceptance. And also focusing on build a foundation of strength.

I reflect on this most days, but certainly the 2-3 times a week I now attend F45 classes. If you aren’t familiar, F45 is a popular strength-based workout – high intensity circuit training for all over body strength. You crank out ~40 different stations in 45 minutes. At the end, my arms and legs are both jelly. In the very best way. Note – the picture above is from their marketing materials. I am not in this photo!

I’m pretty proud of myself for falling in love with strength. As a lifelong runner, it’s never been my favorite workout. For the last few years, I’ve known how important it is to weight train at my age – particularly given my ongoing devotion to running marathons and desiring an active lifestyle for many decades to come. But like many things, life got in the way, particularly my demanding job which compressed my time.

So a few things happened. Somewhere in the 17th mile of the Tokyo Marathon in March, I ruptured the plantar fascia on my right foot. It hurt – badly. But I was committed to finishing and I did. The last 8 miles weren’t pretty – a mixture of walking, running, and hobbling – but completion was the goal and I achieved it. Then I walked nearly 100K steps all over Tokyo while my husband and I saw the sights for about a week.

Needless to say, when I finally got home and saw a doctor, the foot was a wreck. I ended up wearing a boot for 8 weeks and I’m slowly easing my way into more activity – finally getting the greenlight to start baby stepping toward running today.

But in the meantime, I decided this would be the window I would commit to strength. In addition to being limited from running, my summer sabbatical started and I had all the time in the world – for the first time…in my life.

What to do? I signed up for a month at my neighborhood gym to try different fitness classes. The first few I went to were full of older people (like…decades older than me). I applaud their commitment, but these classes did not feel like the fountain of youth.

My good friend came to the rescue. I joined her at a F45 class and surprisingly, loved it. Its high energy. Fast paced. With a great soundtrack each class. I attack the weights with intensity and feel, dare I say, like a bad ass.

Now, I’m very likely the weakest in the class. But all of the stations are moving so fast there isn’t time to compare. Which is good for me. And focusing on each movement keeps my very active brain busy. Which is a gift right now.

Of course, physical strength is only one kind of strength. I’m wanting to embrace these last few months of 50 and build strength in other ways. Strength of perspective. Strength of commitment to myself. Strength to map out my next chapter of life. Strength of love from the family and friends surrounding me.

Even though these last few months have been different than expected, I’m beginning to see the good. And the strength to move forward, smarter, better, and…stronger than ever before.