The Slow-Motion Crisis of an Early Start

Getting ready for gym in the morning can be the most embarrassingly sluggish thing for me. Long ago, back in high school, I could be out the door in no more than 20 minutes. Now, four years later, it takes me at least an hour and a half.

How is that? For a normally pretty darn efficient person, such as myself, this should be considered ridiculous.

Thanks to finally getting used to my 5:30AM starts, I no longer need to stay in bed for a minimum of an hour scrolling through my phone. Now, I'm out within the minute washing my face, making myself a quick breaky (natural yogurt mixed with vanilla whey protein powder with berries and yogurt -- get onto it). Then, I just wait an hour to digest the breaky so I can go to gym without feeling bloated. All in all, I'm not driving into the gym parking lot (FYI. a two minute drive) until 7:15.

I reckon it's because in the morning whatever you normally do is turned into a slow-motion act. While washing my face, I'm entranced by the deadness of my half-asleep face and wondering why my pores always look so invisible only ever in the morning. While making breaky, I also have to turn it into the "Breakfast With Ashley Show" and make sure my bowl looks completely aesthetically pleasing before toddling back to my room, and I have to simultaneously watch a movie like "She's The Man" while I'm getting ready. Where did it all go wrong, Amanda?

I'm like a toddler before nap time: I'll find every excuse to take too long before starting.

Sometimes, however, I do find little tricks on how to actually get my ass out of the house before the gym starts filling up...

• Instagram
  Nothing gets you motivated out the house like a gym bunny on Insta flaunting her abs and pre-workout like she's got her entire life figured out.

Image Credit: Madalin Giorgetta

Image Credit: Brooke Mullen

• A good song
  Dancing wakes you up, even if your moves are incredibly white and dorky. At the moment, "Mambo No. 5" really has me rocking out. Nothing better than getting into a song about a dude having countless women in his life. It's surprisingly empowering (if I pretend I'm the guy in this scenario, anyway).
  
  
• A breaky worth fighting for
  Unsurprisingly, a bowl of oatmeal, honey and seeds really doesn't do it for me. Yogurt and fruit, however, have become my entire life. Having a whole bunch of vanilla ice cream protein thrown in there as well really helps the meal feel like a kick-start. 

• A lush new gym outfit
  Obviously not a day-to-day recommendation, but it's always good to change it up once in a while with something different for your wake-up routine. 

Image Credit: Lorna Jane

Image Credit: Cotton On Body

• Stick to one alarm 
  Or two, if you're like me. Having multiple would usually give me the excuse of going back to sleep. My mind is astonishingly good at holding a persuasive argument in the first few seconds of morning. But having one at 5:30AM and then another a minute after is usually wake-up call enough to send me whining out of bed.
  
• Get out of bed as soon as possible
  This seems obvious, but the longer you stay in bed the more you'll probably debate even leaving the house. So, ideally, wait till breakfast is served before browsing through social media. Avoid breakfast in bed as well. 

Weird Things I Hope Other People Do at the Gym as Well

1. Competing against the athlete next to you like a chihuahua trying to win a fight against a doberman. 

2. Taking the act of ripping out a sanitary sheet from the box like a personal fitness test. And failing miserably in front of everyone (who are "obviously" watching and judging you).

3. Taking someone normal getting on the treadmill next to you (rather than all the others currently available) as an invasion of privacy, and then turning up your headphones as loud as possible in case they try to talk. 

4. Taking someone who is extremely muscled grabbing the treadmill next to you as a personal insult. Am I being used like a before-and-after pic where I'm the "before" and they're the "after"?

5. Letting the huge rolls of sweat drip down your face as a show of defiance against the group of hot athletes strolling into the gym. I will not grab my face towel for you (just a few seconds after when you've already gone past)!

6. Getting stressed out like an overworked dish sponge when someone walks too close by you when you're on the elliptical. And working out the argument in your head that's bound to happen if you end up hitting them with one of the levers.

7. Running while texting and wondering if someone's ever going to call you out on it. And working out that argument in your head as well. Yes, I am currently texting my doctor who just told me I have five months left to live. How dare you make assumptions about me!

8. Accidentally staring too long at the female members of staff. How the hell do they get their legs looking that trim?

9. Wondering if everyone else can hear your music and repeatedly taking out your headphones to check. I'm definitely not cool enough to be listening to rap music. Plus I feel like that's more of a strength-training kind of thing, not meant for the scrawny, red-faced chick panting on the treadmill.

10. Leaving the gym way too early, so you pretend to be short on time as an excuse. Don't forget to huff as you repeatedly check your watch and look mildly rattled as you race out the gym doors.

To Cheat Day or Not to Cheat Day?

Image Credit: Dee Jae

I take my food as seriously as I would a major life decision. Rectifying my eating habits has seen this fact become increasingly true. I’ve been struggling lately to fit in a good ol’ shovelling down of chocolate cake now that I’ve banned myself from takeout, rice, and bread. So, I went for the classic decision: one cheat day a week where I can divulge myself on all things oily, sugary, salty, and carb-loaded. As I sit up in my bed with an aching Buda belly filled to the brink with hot chocolate and sushi (as well as, shamefully enough, half of my friend's cake), I suddenly regret having a cheat day.

 Three months ago I could inhale five cheeseburgers in one sitting, now I’m considering an ambulance van for a simple one-night-stand with junk food. I should see this as a good sign that I feel full way quicker now, but, maybe, because of how rarely I get to chow down on something carby, my weekly tummy ache should tell me I need to handle this differently. 

Image Credit: Dee Jae

Thanks to the way-too-many fitness pages I now follow on Instagram, I have been made aware of an interesting part of the healthy life known as ‘counting your macros’. In this, your daily calorie intake is divided into three categories: carbs, protein, and fat. Depending on what your fitness goals are, the amount of carbs, protein, and fat you should be consuming daily can differ. For example, my goal is to drop down a dress size. For that to happen, I should be consuming no more than 1,500 calories per day, and, macro-wise, this should be broken up as 50% carbs, 30% fat, and 20% protein. As you can see from the images encompassing this post, this might be hard to do if I’m treating each cheat day as an apocalyptic event (i.e. a kind of leave-no-carbs-uneaten type of set-up).

Image Credit: Madalin Giorgetta

 



What the macro life suggests — and while it might sound slightly more unforgiving than the option of a cheat day — leaves you more open to consume what you want when you want. For instance, if your macros are open enough that day, you might be able to squeeze in a slice of pizza. This comes from whether you’ve given yourself enough leeway to consume a bit of junk. For example, something with a high fat content might be manageable if your fat count is low enough to squeeze it in. It’s just all about knowing where your grams are at on the day.

I'm not mentally calculating all this. Right now, I'm working off 'My Fitness Pal', which is a free app I downloaded onto my phone. Here, I am able to scan my food in advance to know whether or not I'm getting enough protein in my diet, as well as whether or not I should grab another serving of peanut butter and celery. Frequently now, I am glaring at the app as I withdraw my hand slowly from the milo tin at the back of my cupboard. I'll admit, however, that it's an absolute blessing knowing I usually have a bunch of calories left to spend at the end of the day for carbs or fat or protein. Now that I know about macros, I can figure out what my body is craving and how to satiate those cravings without reaching for the wrong foods.

Image Credit: Dee Jae

Bowl'n for a Good Smoothie

Image Credit: Ashley Valli

The first sign that my friend and I had finally found the famous cafe ‘Bowl’n’ was announced by an embarrassingly shrill squeal on my behalf. I jumped up and down a little as well. People saw. I’d like to back this moment up, however, for the sake of my own shrivelling self-esteem, with the fact that we’d been looking for the place for almost half an hour. 

Of course, I can’t blame Urban List, the website we’d found it off originally. I’d seen the store named in one of their articles, boasting it as one of the best places to grab an acai bowl. Fabulously, I had mistaken the whereabouts of the place and dragged my friend halfway across Perth convinced it was located somewhere on Murray Street. Then, when he looked up the place, it was far down Williams Street. And, to everyone in sight hustling to get to work on time, were two mates looking like they’d never been caught outside before 9AM in their life. For future reference: we probably hadn’t.

When we decided to retry the website we’d originally found the place off, we were finally given a concrete destination. I set my sneakers to the ground as furiously determined as any girl on an empty stomach.

Bowl’n is a shop tucked into one of the busy walkways of St Georges Terrace. Between the flashy business men walking and talking on their phones and the illustrious-looking women darting past, is Bowl'n glowing with faint neon lights. Beneath the counter, is a fish tank — I don’t know why, but that just made me so much more excited to be there. I, a pretty average girl from Bunbury, went to a café at 8AM where they have fish tanks beneath the counter. How wild!

Image Credit: Gloria Sim

The enormous Cheshire cat grin on my face when I walked inside would’ve alarmed most but, by the unperturbed look on the staffs’ faces, it must’ve been a common sight. My friend and I were handed the menu. From memory, the menu consisted of five or six types of smoothie bowls. The small collection of choices made the decision so much harder. Did I want an antioxidant-rich dish? Oh god, what were my goals for today? Did I need a pick-me-up? A detox? What even is a dragon fruit?

My friend went with the easy decision of a cacao-based bowl. I, after a five-minute pause, decided to go with a bowl called ‘Dragon’, which consisted mostly of kiwi and, of course, dragon fruit. The bowls are roughly $13 dollars each from memory — but, guaranteed, you’re as content as any other $13-dollar meal afterwards. As soon as our smoothie bowls were placed before us, I devoured mine as savagely as I would a damn good cheeseburger. In under ten minutes, I was scraping the leftovers off from the sides of the bowl and helping myself to my friend's as well. It’s great, starting out, to pick neatly at the top layer, making sure to keep the aesthetic appearance of the bowl well intact. It wasn’t long, however, until I was mixing the nut sprinkles, kiwi, coconut flakes, and dragon smoothie together to form a massive glob of thick, pink goodness. My friend, a devoted food Instagramer, watched on in horror. Alas, but the taste of all the ingredients together made it all that much better.

Afterwards, the meal left me in great shape. For the thrill of a risk, I had worn a half-top today as a way to restrain myself from over-eating (the fear of looking like Winnie the Pooh is a great way to keep my eating habits in check). To my surprise, while I felt so full I could barely get out of my seat, my stomach was still as flat as it had been before I had come into the store. For someone like me that usually bloats up like an over-pumped basketball after a hearty meal, this was an amazing discovery.

So, cheers to Bowl’n for fulfilling my white-girl fantasies of a perfectly Instagramable breakfast smoothie bowl.

 

Image Credit: Dee Jae

Trying My Hand at Bikram Yoga

Image Credit: skeene

My first mistake was not taking the time beforehand to appreciate water.

I’m more sweat than anything else right now. My arms and legs tremble over my yoga mat as the instructor encourages the class to move into Chaturanga Dandasana (basically a plank, but with more exhaustion behind it). There’s a guy beside me swiftly moving into the pose. I’d seen him a few minutes before class twisting himself into a knot and walking across a mat. He was making us all look bad, but I was happy to see a few other newbies, like myself, faceplant into their mats with defeat.

 I’d probably equate this moment to filling up your car tank a week ago, and seeing it so full that you forget it needs to be constantly maintained. I, apparently, had forgotten to keep the tank maintained for my big yoga trip: one hour and a half of pure, unrelenting, 40-degree torture. I definitely did not drink enough water beforehand. That’s not to say, however, that I didn’t enjoy it. Hell, I plan on going again, just maybe next time with a better-equipped tank. Before the first half-hour interval had ended, I was already on the ground like a bug dying in a puddle of pesticide.

I’d read up on all the details beforehand: drink water like you’re paid to, wear nothing overly loose, bring a towel, and (while it’s not actually mentioned) wear your cutest gym outfit on the possibility of running into yogi dreamboats. Nothing says dedication like a light dash of mascara — and your tightest gym pants to conceal the fact you haven't worked out in months. I even did my hair up in a cute, preppy ponytail… of course now it hangs down my face like a wet 9-tail whip.

Backpedalling a few steps, my roommate and I arrive in a seemingly free-flowing and peaceful yoga centre where the two front desk girls greet us with big white smiles and the most magnificently glowing skin. There’s flower wallpaper, beautiful men and women walking in and out — also smiling and glowing — and a sign written in a ‘dance-y’ sort of calligraphy: Please remove shoes here. If you’re walking around barefoot, the place must be semi-peaceful, right? — wrong. Not if you’re a McDonalds-loving woman who spends more time watching Sex in the City than making wise decisions. I’d entered a place of hell for unfit wrongdoers like me, and I was about to pay for it.

At the start, my roommate and I are pretty cocky about the whole thing. I mean, look at us: were so urban. We’re just a couple of cool cats taking a casual yoga class at 7AM. Maybe we’ll go to some unheard of hipster-café afterwards and Instagram our pleasantly aesthetic drinks. Who knows? We walk barefoot into the room like a couple of proud parrots. Everyone else is already lying down, even five minutes before the instructor has walked in. Some, like pretzel guy who stretches in front of us, close their eyes and move from pose to pose. I, meanwhile, stare up at the ceiling and dance my naked toes until the instructor walks in.

Originally, I think this isn’t so bad. It’s hot — but it’s like being in a spa, and I relax into the warmth. Then a sharp clap from the instructor’s hands quickly sends me reeling into seven layers of lava-sweat hell. Even my gym-bunny roommate looks slightly wild-eyed from the strenuous demand of movement. It begins with deception: a simple Ardha Chandrasana with Pada Hastasana, which is basically just a much needed stretch for your chest where you lift your arms up and bend from side to side without moving your legs. I’m thinking, God this is great. I feel like some health maniac already. The heat really makes you think you’re getting a strong workout into your weekly routine. But when the class hit its first 15-minute mark that’s when time really starts to slow and bite down on my muscles.

I was the first one to collapse onto my mat mid-pose and take a breather. I must’ve been the envy of all my fellow newbie yogi’s because as soon as I was down, so did one, two, three — four others! We were like soldiers of war all plotting some sort of get away as we eyed off the glass door exits like a safe haven. I even began fanaticising about leaving: just picking up my mat, brushing off my hands, and looking at my fellow yogis like “yes, I am the weakest link. Good day.” But I didn’t! And the reason why isn’t because I chose to stick it out, but because suddenly our positions changed to lying-on-the-floor poses.

Thank. God.

My favourite floor pose was probably the one where you hug yourself side-to-side in the fetal position — the screaming, wailing McDonalds child inside of me really thanked me for it. Pavanamuktasana, it’s called. During this, our instructor coddled us newbies with little sentiments like how all of us did very well for our first time and that yoga isn’t about competing.

Afterwards, I almost didn’t feel like leaving. I’d grown fond of myself sticking to the floor and somewhat crying on the inside. My roommate, at the very sound of the first person out the door, fled the room. My gym bunny roommate. Fled.

I, however, despite being the first poor bastard to hit the floor, stare up at the ceiling for a while before slowly hopping up. I am an ethereal goddess of fitness. When I catch up with my roommate out by the lockers, I talk about craving yogurt and wanting to sip on coconut water. If anyone else had heard me, they would’ve rolled their eyes.

But, putting aside the pain and heat, who doesn’t love being the newbie?