Why Do We Exercise?

Why do you exercise? Now I want you to answer that question as if nobody’s watching. My answer to that question has been different at different times of my life but my enjoyment of it has always been directly related to my answer to this question. I exercise now to teach and earn a living but I also enjoy it. Why do I enjoy it, well, there is a story behind that, a story that directly relates my relationship with exercise and myself. I wasn’t always fit, Shock horror! A Pilates teacher wasn’t always fit, good heavens I imagined her performing a Jete’as she came out of her mother and dropping to the floor in first position. For those of you who didn’t beg their mum for ballet lessons when they where a wee lass or boy, those are terms used to describe a graceful type of jump and a way of holding your feet.
At the tender age of three I said “Mummy I want to do ballet” and she made it so, a year later I was over it and said ‘Mummy I don’t want to do ballet anymore” and she made it so. Well I thought I gave it a good try and it wasn’t for me, 12 months is a life time to a three year old. Ten years later I would still be asked if I was a dancer (secretly loving it ) as I would subconsciously hold my feet in first position as I waited for the school bus.
Early experiences have a huge affect on us especially when it comes to exercise and the way that we use our body. It took me 5 years of Pilates to turn my feet back the right way and loose the dancer walk also known as the daffy duck walk.
It also took me that long to realise that experiences even that far back still affected the way in which I used my body. You see the body is an expression of the mind. No thought goes unnoticed by the body. Which is why I ask the question why do you exercise? The answer to this question may reveal something to you about your present relationship with yourself. I decided I wanted to do ballet, the experience of it was far different to how I thought it would be and so I stopped. At three years old I can’t remember what I was thinking, probably, knowing myself now I just wanted to be on stage and jump about the place and feel beautiful, I didn’t realise their where rules involved. These rules put me off the exercise entirely (sound familiar). Being made to do something or use the body in a way in which mentally doesn’t make sense to you immediately sends the brain into rebellion mode.
Dancing began as a form of human expression to celebrate life, at the end of the day people would gather round the fire and tell stories of their adventures with their bodies. Performing and rules didn’t come into it and if there were certain ways of dancing this was because dancing was a type of language and certain moves would be used as ways of describing events so other tribes members would understand. At the tender age of three I understood this as I had no experience of the world’s expectations of me and so in tune with my instincts. I am not saying that Ballet itself is wrong; it too was developed to tell stories. The great actor and coach Stanislavski said
“Love art in yourself and not yourself in art." In other words, don’t do anything just to show off! Do it to enjoy and understand you. Relating to the subject of exercise know what your intentions are. Your intentions are your experience and if they do not come from a place of excitement and happiness, the true result will not be realized. What is the result we want from doing anything? To be happier and if the intention for exercise does not come from a happy place, if we exercise because we have to, we have lost the battle before we have even begun. So "thank you mum", for letting me be a quitter because without the option to quite we would never try anything. So my point here is to try everything until you find something you like, something which expresses the art/soul/true person whatever you want to call it, in you.
Exercise to celebrate and honour the body and never to condemn or punish it!
It just makes sense.

By Heidi-Ann