I was talking with my housemate about how to be more physically active if you’re not used to it at all because everywhere you’re told to start a training routine where you push yourself a little every day, and while that may seem easy for some people it can be really fucking daunting if you start from zero.
As someone who comes from a very physically active family that doesn’t exercise just for the sake of exercising but do things like walk to the grocery store and bike to work, here’s my advice that has always worked for me:
If you want to walk more start by walking for 3 or 5 minutes. The shortest possible walk you feel you’re capable of. A trip around the block or across the yard. You don’t need to sweat or get your blood pumping. Just a short stroll. The hardest part is to convince yourself to set aside 5 minutes every day to go on this short walk but nothing else about it should be hard. Do it every day and one day you’ll realize that you don’t want to go home just yet. It’s very important that you don’t think “I want to pressure myself to walk further” but rather “I haven’t spent all my walking energy yet. I have more walk in me” and only then do you lengthen the walk. I repeat, at no point should it be exhausting or difficult because even when it feels easy your body will be building muscle and stamina and it will eventually feel too easy and you’ll naturally want to crank it back up to easy again.
If you’re not used to being physically active it might not make a ton of sense when I say that you’ll have more walking energy left but trust me, you’ll get it when you get there.
I grew up with going on evening walks with my parents and passed that on to other housemates who didn’t get it at first but are now going on walks long after they moved somewhere else. Because once you get the hang of it you’ll realize how calming it is on the brain to move the body even if the body isn’t exhausted afterwards.
And it of course helps to entertain yourself especially in the beginning. My housemate started out listening to audiobooks and podcasts but eventually realized Pokémon Go was the best motivator. Whatever you feel like you want to do on your 5 minute easy stroll.
Sometimes you're gonna be trying to do something early and you're going to piss away the whole day making very little progress. Sometimes it'll feel like time just passes under your feet. Sometimes all your little systems you set up to keep you productive aren't going to work. And people aren't going to understand when you explain it.
That's ok. You're not evil, you're not a disappointment and you didn't just peak in high school; you're just experiencing executive dysfunction. Maybe you don't have meds, or the ones you have aren't working quite as much today, or you just have other shit interfering with it.
You don't have to succeed 100% of the time. Sometimes your body and brain are telling you to do things that aren't "productive" that you need. Sometimes you need a walk in the sun or under the moon. Maybe you need to take an hour or two to meticulously clean your room and do laundry. Maybe you needed a nice hot shower or some time with your friends.
People aren't always forgiving or understanding; learn to lie a little for that. But for you, you sweet little creature... learn to forgive yourself. Let this meat puppet you're shambling around in (with???) tell you what it needs. Soft animal of your body and all that. You can't expect to always huff and puff and buckle down to do The Tasks. Fail at this sometimes. Please.
you ever see something and think "wow that community is so cool" and then you remember that you're literally part of it
me when I'm not doing art: hell yea do bad art!!!
me when I'm doing bad art: oh no
you know tumblr is cooking up a witherstorm of terror when your for you thing is only 3 posts long
i had one class today and if it was like thursday or something i could spend the whole day just going into a simultaneously thoughtless lust-rage and omniscient enlightenment but its monday so i gotta keep it in my pants
finally... !
they should invent a kind of venting where i can be really vague without people asking questions and still talk with them about my very specific problem
i've been considering adding a fifth humor into the body. Don't know what its gonna be yet, but it's going to revolutionize biology.
No more vague "I'm going to do evil experiments" larping. Tell me what fucked up experiments you ACTUALLY want to conduct on human test subjects
Too tired/low spoons to put an image ID but. I hate this specific kind of ableism I’ve had handed to me again and again (Edit: added and slightly edited an ID from the notes!)
[ID: A comic. Panel 1 dialogue, from a person holding up a piece of paper: "I'm here to get help with problem X, what should I do?"
Panel 2 dialogue, from a cheery second person, assumedly a tutor or other teaching figure: "Well, what do you think you should do?"
Panel 3: Person 1 stares at person 2 silentely, but their thoughts are written behind them in faint all caps: "Why the fuck would I be asking you for help if I hadn't already tried doing what I thought I should do, and even tried what I thought I shouldn't do!" the rest of the thought is covered by the people but continues to the bottom of the panel.
Panel 4: Sound effect "BAM!" Person 1 cartoonishly flattens Person 2 with a folding chair. /End ID]
they/them | adult | Minors DNI | one million fireballs breath attack | kill all ai scrapers | staff can take one penny off of my cold dead hands
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