Whoa, who’s that dork doing a high-speed yoga routine up there?
Hi, it’s me!!
It’s kind of weird to watch a video of yourself doing yoga – especially when you see how awkward you look because the time-lapse feature on your iPhone sped it up so much.
So why did I film myself doing a yoga routine? Once I get past my self-consciousness, I look at the video to see what needs adjusting; for instance, I could sink a little deeper when I’m in my chair pose. I could also stand to slide my foot a bit higher up my leg, perhaps balance it on my thigh, when I’m in the tree pose.
Aside from looking for what needs to be improved, filming the routine also helps me understand why I do yoga. It shows me how my flexibility has increased, as well as my balance. I also realize that it shouldn’t be a surprise to me that I worked up a sweat during this practice – I’m constantly shifting from the ground to standing to various other poses. My muscles are stretching out and getting warm from the movements, so of course I’m giving my body a workout in the process.
And in turn, I’m also keeping my blood sugar stable. The yoga poses combined with controlled breathing and mind wandering does wonders for both my diabetes and my mental health. More often than not, I ride a straight line on my CGM throughout a yoga practice. It’s a great way to get in the right frame of mind at the start of a day, or unwind at the end of a long one.
Plus, there’s nothing like sinking into child’s pose (lying face down on the mat with your arms extended, your knees apart, and your rear in contact with your heels) or taking a nice long savasana (or corpse pose, in which you lie face up with your eyes closed, arms at your side, with fingers and toes spread open – without letting your muscles tense up) at the end of a practice to reset the mind.
Can’t beat the benefits of yoga.
Hugging the Cactus 
For me, I’ve always been and forever will be a weight lifter. I found out years ago that is the best at not so much keeping my sugar level down but keeping it stable. I kid you not. If I stopped lifting for more than 3 days, say an entire week, my numbers started doing their own yoga routine. Up, down, and sideways was the direction they would travel. Once I got back to lifting on a regular basis,3 to 4 times a week, my numbers leveled off. Only years later did I find out a reason why, two reasons actually. First weight lifting doesn’t boost my metabolism as high as aerobics but it keeps it up much longer. After a good hard workout, your metabolism is kept up by your body tearing down the muscles and building them back up bigger and stronger than before, 36 to 48 hours longer. Another benefit is heavy resistance weight training lowers insulin resistance. So my passion for lifting heavy and being as strong as I could be all those years kept my insulin receptors working at a much higher level than without. Who’d of thunk it?! lol Well that is my exercise story, No I will not be video taping myself. I hate having my picture taken let alone be video taped.
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