The Beauty of it All

Pied Beauty
Gerald Manley Hopkins

Glory be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trades, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spáre, strange;
Whatever is fickle, frecklèd (who knows how?)
With swíft, slów; sweet, sóur; adázzle, dím;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is pást change:

Práise hím.

One of my favourite poems relating to beauty - ever woken up with the sky an intoxicating blue, a gentle breeze blowing and the soft morning light dancing across your bedcovers (only today to become stinking hot later on, but that is for another post!)

On Wednesdays I teach two classes, an early early RPM and Bodystep in the mid morning. My RPM class is a small but very loyal bunch who I love to teach every morning - a few come to High Performance, but Wednesday has a very different vibe to it. It's as if I come to a small family celebration. I deliberately chose pretty complex choreo to learn for Step this week in my quest to be a banging step instructor and was delighted to teach my whole class with only a few minor mistakes.

I then met hubs (today's task was purchase of new dining table (Recycled Aussie Hardwood - blissfully beautiful) and an outdoor setting (lightweight and easy to clean..woot) and commented that the reason I love teaching so much is what I get in return for making the effort. I get friendship, I get smiles, I have a laugh, I am challenged and I feel so good about myself. I swear I need to bottle this feeling to see me through the downtimes..".Eau de StinkyBike Shorts Liz perfume", perhaps?

The only downside of my day is that perhaps I got too vigorous with the mattress testing yesterday - I have a very odd painful lump on the border of my clavicle/acromion (near shoulder). Ah well, a sniff of "Eau de Stinky" and I'm thinking "I'm sure this problem can be solved!"

Time for dinner - leftovers! It's about all I can afford after our few days of Economic Stimulus..

Unprepared for pranayama

In case anyone is wondering, pranayama is the technique of breathing and breath control which regulates energy flow and aims at maintaining energy balance in yoga.

Today I taught RPM, slammed down breakfast, reviewed my Step choreo, taught Bodystep then participated in yoga. It is a mix of Hatha and Power Yoga and we started with a relaxation sequence - unlike the first time, I relaxed my mind and breath straight away and was beginning to feel like a smug yogini but once we started into our Sun Salutation, and various poses within this, I started feeling really seedy. My problem? Low blood sugar it seems - feeling dizzy really dents your enthusiasm for Downward Dogs, so I quietly snuck out of the room with my apple and refueled - feeling much better, it was back to the group fitness room for the relaxation (perfect!). The above picture can mean many things, today it represents that I was feeling rather messy doing my yoga!

Now back to the picture - it's a famous "droodle" and can be interpreted in many ways. For example this picture could refer to:

• A spider doing a handstand.
• Total eclipse of the sun on a stick.
• A family of worms stuck on a toffee apple.
• A frightened mop.
• A dandelion seed making a perfect landing.
• A supermodel on a bad hair day. ( I particular like this one, because it happens to me often - the hair, not the supermodel!)

I try and think of droodles when my hubby and I talk about what's important in the house (he has been blissfully ensconced in cabling up the room we are going to call the home cinema. I hardly watch TV, so I'm concentrating on what's going in the kitchen and bathroom instead). Actually I'm pretty lucky that we agree on most decisions (though I could care less about speaker cable, just for the record).

I really enjoyed both RPM and Bodystep although my legs are still screaming from Monday's "pussy effort" on the weights (really, you'd think I was lifting monster load here, but it's woefully small) and my triceps were on fire from our dumbbell extensions yesterday (I do believe that I heard "sook" emanating out of the back corner of the group fitness studio as I did all push ups rather than tricep push ups in our conditioning track!) Hmm, I'll just have to wait until Friday to give the girl a thorough pasting in RPM (he he he)

Talk to Me (All I want is a little conversation)

Yeah, all I want is a little conversation! I was inundated with the response to my "Fierce Conversation" post and it was great to see so many people popping in a comment about things.

So inspired by my spaceman Ace Frehley (especially for Carolyn!) I've decided that I want you all to "Talk to Me" about issues you want to see blogged about (I could start with 'why did KISS have to take off their makeup - in their case makeup definitely maketh the men..) so leave me a comment or contact me via The Fitness Solution - I would love to hear from you, fitness related or not.

Today you now know that I'm a not so closet KISS fan - "Unmasked" was the first KISS purchase I made and I just thought Ace Frehely in his Spacesuit was just the bomb and I was in all of Grade Six!

Fitness and loving life wise, I've had a terrific day - started off with a cracker of an RPM class - we were small in numbers but made up for it in sweat. Then teaching Bodystep - was rather chuffed with myself for learning 5 new tracks and giving it a good caning. Miss Shelley (sans itchy MM balls) turned up to step with me and listen to me sing a poor rendition of "The Way You Make Me Feel" and then we both gave Lynne's Yoga Class a go - this was harder than I thought and my abs and shoulders got a thorough pasting with all those Downward Dogs. The meditation part was definitely the highlight and I left with a rather fuzzy warm sense of joie de vivre.

Then off to quickly slam down lunch with hubby and off to choose bathroom tiles which we did in record time before it was home to pick up the girls and take Miss G to ballet.

All that activity today has given me a wicked appetite and I feel like I haven't stopped chowing down all day which is always a bit disconcerting but it will even out in the end. But better to listen to genuine belly hunger and have a feed than to go over the edge and eat up eating a whole load of stuff that doesn't honour your beliefs or your belly!

Thursday's thoughts

Thursday is the day that I teach Bodystep at Fitness First. As I have previously blogged, I have only just started teaching Step again after a looong layoff and I am loving it! It's such a departure from the usual training I do and classes I teach ( I know my RPM class wouldn't be too enthused if I started adding armlines) , it's got some real fun factor going on. Plus connecting with the other Step instructors (most of whom do other programs like Pump and Bodyjam) has been a hoot.

In terms of competition preparation I've just been humming along and doing what I can, whilst accepting what I can't do - brings the old "do your best and forget the rest" Tony Horton mantra to the surface. I have noticed some changes in the old lean-o-meter this week and wish that I had more muscle - I think I've been looking at pictures of all those pro IFBB girls, some of who I'm sure have pharmaceutical help as well as hard training under their belts. However, I'm a firm believer in competing naturally, so I'll leave it there.

I have to work hard at my leanness, particularly at the beginning of any prep before anything happens. That is my pattern and the good drops I'm reporting are a culmination of all of the work that has gone beforehand rather than it being suddenly the event of the day. Now I've broken through with the initial good loss, based on my own past experience, I should be able to cruise in and put in some maintenance weeks which is nice. I heard a great quote this morning: " Many of life's failures are those people who were so close to success and gave up". Can't remember who it was by but it's a good one to have by you when things aren't running as you'd like them (for me, more often than not!)

Dance, dance, ants in my pants!

Today's post is all about how, despite feeling blue about a few things over the past few days, I decided to reclaim my power through a bit of hard work and discipline.

It is all too easy to decide we are powerless over something and it is all too easy sometimes to wallow in your own misery, ie "this is too hard", "life is unfair", "why me and no one else?" etc etc. Naturally my own emo moments were running along the lines of "life is unfair" when my planned dinner turned out to be off and the fallout from the gym mix up on Saturday left me with a definite, "life is unfair" moment going on.

Anyway, to jump to another topic, I have been asked to fill two Bodystep classes a week for the next few weeks. I don't get much chance to teach Step as I don't have a regular class these days and hence, when the new releases come out I don't always learn the choreo because I figure that I'll get around to it when I have my own class. Rather than use the same choreo I am used to, I decided to push myself out of my comfort zone and learn new stuff to teach this morning. Even though I made a few mistakes I felt like my class well and truly made up for it with the intensity side of things - I really pushed it and felt like I was flying! I was drenched in sweat from head to toe when I was done and felt such a sense of accomplishment for getting a bit uncomfortable and really going for it. I didn't learn an entire release - the goal for next week's classes is to learn the second half and put the whole shebang together. Then hopefully send off my Certification video (only six years late, but..hey)

I'm so glad I pushed myself and believed in myself to get the job done. Consequently I feel on top of the world and not remotely interested in doing any emotional eating - there's the kicker, manage your moods and believe that you can handle anything and the battle with the emotional side will begin to pale. That is not to say that I will never eat for emotional reasons again - however this sort of stuff makes you sit up and take notice before you start heading for the muesli bars again which is why working it all out is so important.

I'm not usually one to log my scale weight but I want to do a Shelley today and write....
59.1kg (down .1kg - that piss-ant weenie amount...liar liar, pants on fire!) Hee, hee, the small things we do to amuse ourselves....

Runnin' Wild and Free

I'm recovering from a big weekend of launches - 3 RPM and 1 Bodystep class. The title of my post today reflects Track 5, "Running Wild and Free" by a group called Airbourne. It's a really meaty thumper of a track and the noise that an entire room full of RPMers can make during it is really something else - did anyone say "hey,hey,hey!". My favourite track of Bodystep this round was the Party Track - "Get Me Bodied" by Stardancer2 which was great fun.

Yesterday happened to be an unscheduled rest day due to Miss G being unwell. Luckily she is firing on all cylinders this morning and so am I - lucky really as I am subbing a Hi Performance class this afternoon, so I had better have my game face on!

Appropriate recovery is just as important as good training - the down time yesterday did me good, even though genetically my recovery is superb. Gotta look after my little "ability".

Training Update

Today I had the opportunity of participating in Ruthie T's RPM class. Amongst us Les Mills afficiondos, Ruthie T has legendary status, being the head choreographer for Bodystep until Release 55 (I think) and featuring in numerous Bodypump, RPM and Bodystep DVDs. I think Ruthie's gift lies in her ability to be "at ease" with herself and her participants. I worked hard and felt a zen like calm wash over me as I rode. I had my 10 minute obligatory warm up run beforehand and had an abbreviated chest and bicep workout.

I also got up with the sun and had a nice hour long walk to get the daily newspaper. I don't count this as working out, I call this early morning time to myself. I listen to my IPOD and enjoy some early morning quiet time because when I get home it certainly is anything but quiet.

I've enjoyed a little more scale loss this week and am edging closer to that 60kg mark. Nutrition has been good but not perfect. Tonight, I had Thai left overs with plenty of steamed veggies. In my old life I would have freaked out - "coconut cream---oooh how fattening - this meal isn't clean". In my new life I now know coconut cream contains good saturated fats and that it's not a reasonable portion of red curry of chicken, beans and eggplant with steamed rice (who can resist that) that will derail me, it's mindless eating and bad habits.

Heck, I even had Mexican the other night (which is a carb and fat fest) and rather than beating myself up for having such an offplan meal, said "oh well" and just got on with it, realizing that I haven't eaten a Mexican meal for well over a year. It's not the rare off plan meals that ruin a transformation, it's every day bad habits. (did I just say that - heck I must have wanted to make a point!).

Busy busy and the "off season" look

Here's a great pic of Alicia who is almost at the peak of her "off season" training. I'm particularly proud of Miss Alicia because she has totally turned her whole training and eating regime around in the past few months ... and as you can see from the pic, she is living lean and loving life as well as putting on a good whack of muscle - this is evident by the fact that she can do many many unassisted pull ups! Doesn't she look awesome?

I managed to put in a fairly decent week training wise and was absolutely thrilled to hit a PB on my dumbell press yesterday. I gave the girls a good thrashing in RPM yesterday.

Today, though, the traffic was so bad that I missed half of my class, my fantastic GFC stepped in and taught the first half - though my legs certainly weren't happy about starting at Track 5.

It will be a busy week with 6 classes to teach and 4 strength training sessions to complete. I am now looking for more progression from Mike which will be interesting. But first it is off to prep for Bodystep tomorrow at Toowong.

Rolling along!

Today's training: prefatigue quads workout (10 minutes of ouch!), teach Bodystep - that wasn't part of the "plan" but Shelley called me this morning, sick as a dog and I was happy to help her out. It was a good class - the Wednesday crew are a really nice bunch and as well as working up a terrific sweat, it was good fun.

After class, I grabbed a quick bite - my "On the Go" standby of a Slim Secrets bar and piece of fruit and then headed back into the gym to learn my choreography. After an hour of playing around, I was ready for a shower and lunch (which was prepacked in my cooler/Esky and just waiting to be eaten!).

This afternoon was spent with the girls at Jazz Ballet - they are just too much fun to watch - then home for dinner and catch ups with clients.

My place in the sun!

This is one of my photos from Jadey last October wearing my beautiful Lorna Jane threads! Brisbane has been dreary and raining, quite the opposite of "Beautiful One Day, Perfect the Next". Seriously, compared with Woop Woop it really is paradise!

Today I met one of my clients who is competing in the INBA comp in October - we trained legs together and I showed her a few of my little "Liz surprises". I doubt I will be able to walk in a straight line tomorrow and if she doesn't have DOMS either, I shall be quite miffed! It was great fun and really motivating to push each other hard. Usually I'm very much a "by myself" trainer in the gym and this was an excellent change of pace.

I then had to teach Bodystep at North Quay to a packed out class of three people. These classes are just as valuable as the big ones - you are forced to "connect" with your participants and to really inspire, coach and motivate. I filled in a little time with some walking treadmill cardio and there was a preview of Mike McSweeney's CORE program which is rolling out in Fitness First around the country. I am booked in to do the training for this in early August - the class revolves around the use of the BOSU and I am looking forward to it immensely.

Then it was home to take the girls to dancing, cook dinner, contact clients and now go to bed!

I know I'll be sleeping well tonight!

Strut, pout, put it out!

This morning I got the opportunity to sub a Bodystep class. I have not had much chance to teach the last release at all with my schedule so it was a welcome break to get into the Group Fitness Room and "strut, pout, put it out!" (Track 8). It was a lot of fun and a great break from the seriousness and focus of RPM. I will get to teach the class again in a few weeks' time - can't wait.

Apart from that, fairly quiet and cold here today - it's only 12 degrees in my kitchen which is unusual for Brisbane.

Catching a wave!

Busy, busy, busy today - firstly taught Bodystep which was a lot of fun this morning. Then it was onto the New Rules of Lifting Workout B which is focused on compound exercises - more bang for your buck. I was pleased to increase the weight used in my deadlift and close grip pulldown and the whole exercise didn't seem nearly as painful as last week.

My panel interview was deferred until next week. This is fine by me as I am still adjusting to moving in properly. My DH tells me that judging by the untidy state of the house that I'm the happiest I have been for a long time.

He's right of course - I am most definitely riding a positive energy wave and life is good!