Exercise is a means of finding your ubiety
Our guest blogger, Erica Pease, is a fitness professional and founder of Studio 37 – a new women-only gym near Shepton Mallet. Launched on 15th July, Studio 37’s goal is to empower women to love what their bodies and minds can do.
Finding ubiety, that blissful moment of contentedness, that happy place where you are in the moment, neither dwelling on the past or worrying about the future, can seem like the most unattainable challenge in our busy lives. And yet, these moments, these conscious moments of living in the present without worry, fear or judgement, are the building blocks of our ability to manage the maelstrom of daily life with all the stress, juggling and if you have kids, tantrums that this can include.
To find yourself truly in the moment whilst trying to keep all the balls of your life in the air can be hard but what if I told you there was a way to improve your health AND find that precious state of ubiety? I want to make the slightly unorthodox case for exercise as a means of finding your ubiety.
Yes, really.
For so long exercise has been seen as a purely results driven enterprise; a not very pleasant means to a worthy end. Of course to a greater or lesser extent it always will be about setting goals and getting results but, and this is the crux of it, exercise is so much more than that hard, unenjoyable, sweaty thing you do because you know you should.
And we do know that we should. The physical benefits of exercise are countless from stronger muscles and stronger bones, to reducing our risk of morbid diseases, living longer, and being able to stay healthy and active into later years, enjoying our children and grandchildren to the greatest extent possible.
These things are unquestionably important. Living an active and healthy life should, in my admittedly biased opinion, be the cornerstone of each and every one of our lives. But the mental and psychological benefits to exercise are the under reported and undervalued stars of the show and it is in these benefits that I find my Ubiety.
Firstly when you are concentrating on something intensely physical it’s hard to also concentrate on all those stresses and worries that occupy your normal waking mind. Coming out of your head and into your body even if it’s just for half an hour is something I cannot recommend enough. Not only does it allow you to switch off from those worries, it also allows you to come back into the real world after your workout with a sense of perspective; a fresher mind, although your body may be tired, with which to tackle seemingly insurmountable problems.
Secondly, the endorphins that surge round your body after exercise can be some of the most wonderful feelings imaginable! They feel like nature's reward for all that hard work.
And here is the best bit. If you focus on exercise as an enjoyable entity in its own right, a pastime in which to truly live in the moment, those results that you’ve been chasing will be within your grasp because you’re doing something that you enjoy (and probably doing more of it). I speak about this a lot with my clients: exercise is a little bit like finding “the one”. You have to kiss a lot of frogs to find the one you love and want to spend the rest of your life with. In the same way, try lots of exercise until you find the one that makes your heart sing and that you will enjoy doing two, three, hell four times a week.
That is when you will find your Ubiety.
Go on, give it a go.
Photo by Clique Images on Unsplash
