exercise — Blog — Carolee Walker

Excerpt from GETTING MY BOUNCE BACK: Hardwiring happiness

Once you train yourself to consciously absorb the positive experience or to tell yourself you are absorbing the positive experience, the payoff is you’ll begin to create new neural connections that transform passing mental states, such as feeling cheerful, into lasting neural traits, i.e., being a cheerful person.

Maybe this is what happens subconsciously to people who live amid incredible natural beauty. I suspected this when I lived in the San Francisco Bay Area, and I’m wondering if this is what is happening in Jamaica.

When helping yourself means reaching out to others for help

“How would you feel about categorizing your book as self-help or personal growth?”

I was having a telephone conversation with an editor at a publishing house about my memoir. I had finished the manuscript in August and had been pitching the project to literary agents and publishers, taking online workshops on how to publish a book, and tweaking the pages based on feedback from readers.

I was never sure whether it was a good idea to call my book a memoir. I’m always visiting bookstores to look at what’s on the memoir shelf or the self-help, psychology, or personal growth shelves, so I get why she was asking the question.

It’s my fitness journey, that’s true, but I wouldn’t say fitness defines me.

“Sure,” I said, “I’m good with that.”

Exercise, Fitness, Health, Memoir, Personal Growth, Self-HelpCarolee WalkerMarch 12, 2018self-help, memoir, Health, Fitness, feeling good, exercise, writing, confidenceComment

How you know it's working

It's ridiculous that after all these years I'm still fighting with myself at night to wash my face. I look at myself in the mirror as I'm brushing my teeth and think, what's the worst that could happen?

And then I clean my face, removing any makeup around my eyes, exfoliate, use toner, apply products my dermatologist prescribed for me and then serum and nighttime moisturizer on my face and neck. The whole thing takes too long, but there aren't any short cuts. I've tried.

The other night, as I was having this conversation with myself in the mirror, I noticed my skin was looking not bad. I've still got that lived-in look, but the lines in my forehead, in particular, were, without a doubt, less prominent.

Exercise, Fitness, Health, NutritionCarolee WalkerDecember 26, 2017exercise, Wellness, weight loss, feeling good, lifestyleComment

Try smiling up that hill and other tips to help you stick to an exercise routine

Nutrition, Health, Fitness, ExerciseCarolee WalkerOctober 16, 2017exercise, weight loss, Aging well, self-talk, Perseverance Comment

Here's what happens when I walk

I am a walker.

Every day.

Ok I'm also a runner. You know that.

I used to schedule walking on my workout day off or when I was rehabbing an injury.

But lately I've noticed it's the walking that's making the difference in my overall sense of joy and well being that I get from exercise.

Exercise, Fitness, HealthCarolee WalkerJuly 7, 2017exercise, walking, Health Comments

Harder, better, faster, stronger: And now, smarter

I always found it ridiculous that high schoolers who never played sports thought the football team was made up of dumb jocks especially when many players ended up at our best colleges and universities.

Where did the stereotype of the dumb jock come from?

Just watch a professional soccer game or Major League Baseball or any Olympic event and think about how much stuff the players are pouring into their brains before, during, and after the games. Ok some of these athletes might make stupid decisions off the field in their personal lives, but these have nothing to do with smarts.

So I'm not surprised to read about another study showing that exercise is good for your brain.

Exercise, Health, Fitness, RunningCarolee WalkerMay 1, 2017Running, endurance, exerciseComment

Where it began

By last Thursday afternoon I was feeling the effects of the upper body workout I did with Zach Schumaker, my trainer, on Wednesday night. My pecs were so inflamed and sore I wasn't 100 percent convinced I wasn't having a heart attack. In general I welcome delayed onset muscle soreness (DOMS) because it means I'm placing stress on my muscles, allowing them to adapt.

But then of course I'm forced to change up my training. So on Friday, instead of cross training on the elliptical or swimming, I did walking intervals on the treadmill at a 12 percent incline; no stress on the upper body but I got my heart rate up high enough to feel great getting ready for work and throughout the day.

I was planning to do a long swim Saturday morning but still felt sore. A year ago I would have pushed through but if I've learned anything through all of this it's the value of deloading. So instead, with my head still on my pillow, I smiled.

I'll do an easy run.

It wasn't the run that made me smile, although I enjoy these shakeout runs.

It was the bagel. With peanut butter.

Exercise, Fitness, Health, Nutrition, RunningCarolee WalkerFebruary 12, 2017exercise, Fitness, Health, weight loss, Nutrition, grit Comments

But I do I do

"Welcome to my year of aging youthfully."

This is what I typed in response to one of the birthday wishers on my Facebook timeline on Wednesday. (Remember when we called it a "Wall"?)

"You are finding the key to aging backwards," my childhood friend Debbie Levine Herman wrote.

(I fully embrace the world of Facebook. I view it as a gigantic community bulletin board and LOVE seeing posts no matter how trivial or silly and count on them to keep me up to date period.)

Exercise, Fitness, HealthCarolee WalkerJanuary 13, 2017skiing, exercise, overcoming fearComment

But, oh, I got stamina

Why it matters what I tell myself when I run

I reconnected over the summer with a woman I first met when I was living outside San Francisco and our daughters had become friends. We were having coffee in Palo Alto late one afternoon when she told me she had lupus.

The subject came up because she was apologizing for meeting me in her workout clothes as she was just coming from the gym.

Really? Everyone in Palo Alto looks like they're in exercise clothes.

She told me that one of the ways she copes with bouts of extreme pain in her joints is by exercising regularly.

This memory popped into my head a few weeks ago as I woke up after sleeping nearly 12 hours. The last of my Thanksgiving guests had left late on that Saturday, and I practically passed out within minutes.

My plan had been to do a longish run that Sunday morning, but when I stepped out of bed, my sides and lower back were so sore and stiff that I nearly crept down the stairs to make myself a cup of coffee.

I assumed I had suffered a sleeping injury by being in bed so long.

Exercise, Fitness, Health, Running, SwimmingCarolee WalkerDecember 28, 2016exercise, endurance, Fitness, self-help, self-talk, mindfulnessComment

When life gets in the way, yeah

Nothing tastes as good as healthy feels.

This popped into my head after I instinctively extended my arm to help a woman, probably in her late 50s, as she walked from her car into a theater in Warsaw, Indiana, a few weeks ago.

We were standing on a slight incline steps from the entrance. A bus pulled up and began to unload. I was seeing the 2 pm matinee of "Grease" at Wagon Wheel Center for the Arts with my close friend Carmelita Watkinson, and it was a gorgeous day. We were there to see her awesome and talented son Sean play the role of Danny Zuko.

Exercise, Health, FitnessCarolee WalkerSeptember 3, 2016Health, exercise, obesity Comments

Magical mystery ride

"If you don't believe in yourself, why should anyone else believe in you?"

"You have to love yourself before you can expect another person to love you."

These phrases were etched into my being years ago, but in the past couple of weeks I've had a bit of an epiphany.

I used my early morning walks to catch up on podcasts after my finger surgery when I could not run or swim or bike and zoomed in on an interesting connection from one podcast to the other.

Sometimes it makes sense to hang back and let someone else have confidence in you.

Health, Exercise, FitnessCarolee WalkerJuly 24, 2016Fitness, fitness habit, exercise Comment

Take it all in your stride

I’m in the habit of checking myself out, body part by body part, when I wake up in the morning.

Ok I’m checking out the status of the ring of fat around my abdomen I’m working hard to crush but mostly I do this so I can decide how much time I’ll need to warm up before running. If it’s a swim day, I just make a mental note of what’s achy or crunchy and figure I’ll sort it out in the pool.

If I don’t self-assess in the morning I usually regret it.

Running, Fitness, HealthCarolee WalkerApril 14, 2016Sexual health, exercise, endurance, Running Comments

BE THE DOG

Digging in, discovering who I am, and seeing how far I can push myself to be strong, fit, and healthy

"Welcome to my year of aging youthfully."

Why it matters what I tell myself when I run

CAROLEE WALKER