Friday, July 11, 2014

Who am I, anyway?

This is not another motivational fitness blog. 
Don’t get me wrong... I have nothing against motivational fitness blogs. In fact I love them. I’m a little bit obsessed with them. They blow up my inbox all day long with random training tips, recipes I’ll never make, and photos of sweaty chicks. And I like that. 
I wake up every morning and I read the shit out of them. 
And... that’s partially why I’m writing my own blog. 

Let me back up and get into who the f I even am. 

Basically, I’m a 24 year old actress living in New York City doing, well... all of the things that go along with being a 24 year old actress in New York City. Sometimes I feel like that is the greatest thing ever in the world to be and sometimes it’s like ahhhhwhatthefuckamidoingwithmylife... but it mostly airs on the side of greatest thing ever. So, that’s good. 

But... right now I’m going through one of those... things. Those having a lot of feelings things. You know, you get it. I could say it’s “one of those phases you go through in your twenties” and yeah, it’s that, but I’m pretty sure it’s just one of those universally human points of transition in your life where you feel a little confused and occasionally depressed but you also know that your life is good and you don’t really have anything tangible to complain about... and when you talk about your life to other people you’re all “Rah-rah my life is super awesome!” but then you go home and sit on your couch alone on a Friday night and get a case of the bad/sad/empty feelings. 
Louis C.K.  says it best... the “forever empty”(watch that clip and you’ll get it exactly). 

I’m pretty sure there are two ways to deal with this. 
Well that is an extreme oversimplification because there are many, many ways to deal with this but what I mean is... there’s a healthy way to deal with it and an unhealthy way to deal with it. And I’ve tried them both. 

So... some background.

When I first moved to New York and got a big ole case of the really sads I filled the sad spots with alcohol. Lots of alcohol. And then I gained some weight and that made me even more sad plus I felt shitty all the time and then I moved out of New York and back upstate and blamed New York for making me depressed. (Because of course it was New York’s fault)

I moved in with my boyfriend Michael who was living upstate at the time and he’s really into the gym. Like... religiously into the gym. 6 days a week, sometimes 7, nevermissaworkout, super in-shape guy.


Don’t get me wrong, I was always into exercise. Always an athlete in school, blahblahblah, I like exercise and always have. But after the organized sports phase of life was over mostly I would just run a lot. I like running, and I like running outside, but that’s pretty much all I was doing. So I would “go to the gym” with Michael which literally meant just entering the gym building and running like a hamster while he picked up all the heavy things. 

And then finally after a few months of “going to the gym” with Michael I was like... teach me your ways, master yoda. I want you to train me, I wanna workout for real. Long story short, a gym rat was born. 

I got reeeeeal into the gym. Well... ok....not right away. At first I was like “Ewwww no I can’t. I can’t do a push up. That’s haaaardddd. That’s too heavyyyyyy. Nooooo. I don’t wanna” and was essentially the most annoying person to train ever and everyone else in the gym probably wanted to murder me but Michael was a saint and very patiently told me that yes, I could, and that once I finally stopped whining I would figure that out. 

And I did. 
I quit my bitching (which thinking back on, I am very embarrassed about, but whatever, moving forward) and with Michael’s guidance I developed a gym routine that I really liked. He actually taught me his gym routine, and once I got good at it we started doing it together. Same exercises (but, obviously, different weights). 

I was working out like a dude, and I fuckin’ loved it. I got workout gloves. I went every day. And at first I complained that I didn’t want to get “too bulky” but then I learned that as a female you actually have to try really freakin hard to get “bulky” and that I was in absolutely no danger of that in and every position to get stronger and way more toned. 

Fast forward.
I moved back to New York, gym routine in hand. I also started school at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting which was really great for my life in so may other ways that I won’t get into right now because that is not exactly the focus of the story I am trying to tell... but anyway life was definitely better. And it was better because I had structure. Turns out, I really like structure. Whatever, I’m a virgo, we like rules and structures and nerdy things like that. It’s cool, I’ve embraced it. 

Now I had a gym structure for my mornings and a school structure for my evenings. That was great. The sucky part was that Michael was still living upstate so we had to do the distance thing which really, really sucked. So, even though I had my 2 structures that made me very happy I still had a lot of the sad empties flying around in my insides. 

So, I went through a lot of phases to try to deal with that were mostly unhealthy. I read “Skinny Bitch”. I went through a vegetarian phase, and eventually a vegan phase. I have a lot to say about that but I think I’ll save it for another blog post. Basically I was eating terribly under the guise of what I thought was “healthy”, drinking way too much again, and hating on my body big time.

Fast forward again. 
Michael moved in with me in the city. (hoooooRAYYYYY!)
And I asked him for a nutrition plan to go with my gym routine. 

Woooooaaaaaaaa. 
Turns out when you pair nutrition with exercise... fucking magic happens. I know that most people already know that, but at that point I did not.



Ok, to the point already. 

Basically, what I’ve learned from all of this is that my healthy habits get me through tough times waaaaaay better than my unhealthy ones. When I’m being really good about my nutrition and exercise, I feel like a rockstar and my body feels like a superfast well oiled machine that blasts problems out of its way like they’re little ants. So, because I am feeling a lot of feelings lately, I want to get back to a more strict version of my healthy structure. Also, this probably has a lot to do with the fact that I’ve just completed the program at Adler and in the absence of that structure... I need to hold on tight to structures I still have.

I’m sure what I’m really trying to do is fill a hole where school used to be with my lovely supportive network of classmates and teachers and things that I love... but, I’ll deal with the inner Freudian psychoanalytic stuff later. Right now I’m just gonna write a fitness blog. 

But... here’s why I say this is not a motivational blog. 

I mess up. A lot. I get really confused because there is SO. MUCH. INFORMATION. in the health and fitness industry and just when I think I’ve learned a thing I read another thing that says exactly the opposite of that first thing.

I can’t motivate you because most of the time I do not have a single fucking idea what I am even talking about.

I looked into becoming a trainer but this is ultimately why I decided not to. I have a hard enough time motivating myself let alone a bunch of strangers who are just as whiney as I was when I first started.

....but I’m trying. 

I’m really sick of reading the words “my fitness journey” and “it’s a lifestyle, not a diet” so what this is, really, is just me. A person who has discovered they’re really into fitness. Trying to figure it out and probably royally messing it up along the way.

So if you’d like to read about it, for some reason I decided to put it on the internet.

I guess I’m inviting you to come with me for the ride as I attempt to wade through endless information, slough through some bullshit and attempt to maintain a healthy life and a fit bod...while still being 24 in New York City.  Cuz in the end... don’t we all just wanna look and feel good? 


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