I ain't no chump!!

This is a little saga about me and Spin class.

It started out several months back with my friend Jessica and my trainer Karen both suggesting I add spin to my workout routine. I cannot tell you how many times I rolled my eyes, visible to them or internally. Spin? Seriously? You have to be kidding me. There are some things in the gym reserved for the skinny girls. (Like the Step Mania class...in which you apparently have to be old and skinny, but that's another story altogether!) There is no way my big butt could do a spin class. Seriously. So stop pushing me about it. And they did. Mostly. For whatever reason, this was something that the more it was brought up, the more I dug in my heels. Wait, what do I mean 'for whatever reason'? I don't know if I'm fooling you all, even slightly, but I sure wasn't fooling myself. The reason was simple: I lacked the confidence. Oh sure, I've gained loads of confidence with each passing day. But I still lack the confidence to try something and fail. And really, it's not about my failing in general. It's about my failing in front of others. Because you know, the other ladies in spin are completely consumed with how I'M doing. They aren't there for their own goals. They're there to watch ME.

Seriously, one of these days I'm going to truly accept that people are not nearly as obsessed with me as I seem to think they are.


Anyway....fast forward through going to buy padded bike shorts and then blowing out my calf muscle. Fast foward to last Tuesday. That's when I did it. I went to Spin class. I thought the class was 45 minutes. I figured I'd do what I could and if I got to 45, that would be awesome but I would just focus on doing as much as I could.
Then they took a vote and decided to go for an hour. Dammit. Well, about 20 minutes in, I thought there was just no way my legs would hold out much longer. I was cutting it off at 30. But then I looked up and it was 35 minutes. So I vowed to make it to the 45 I originally thought it would be. But when I got there, I went the distance. Because I'm no chump!!!!

Today was my second attempt. I'm shocked at how much better I did. And I had a major attitude at the gym today. I came very close to deciding that Spin would just be way too hard. But, as bad as I felt, I knew I'd feel even worse for just walking away. So I told myself just to go, but gave myself permission to leave early if I needed to. Of course, I didn't need to. Once I got going, my attitude improved. And the time pretty much flew by.

I'm not sure if my attitude improved because of endorphins, or because when I push myself, I feel better. I think it's the latter. Because the more I push myself, the better I feel in general. Because I ain't no chump!