Walking obsessed?

Most of the time, weekends are for relaxing and taking the opportunity to de-stress from the work week.  That wasn't necessarily the case for me this weekend...  Yesterday when I woke up, I was planning on having a lazy day.  I was going to start my day by relaxing in bed and reading before getting out of bed.  That didn't happen.  I heard a voice in my head telling me I could relax and be lazy after I got up and worked out.  I don't know why I suddenly had the desire to work up but I decided to get up, put on my workout clothes, get a new set of headphones (because the ones I had didn't fit very well on my ears), and I went to the beach to walk the bike path.  I had never been along that particular path so I didn't really know what to expect...  I was in for a huge shock!

While this path had absolutely beautiful views of the waves crashing onto the beach, it also had a winding path along a huge hill.  I put on my new headphones, turned on the music and tackled the hill.  When I made it up and over, I looked back and felt pretty good about my accomplishment.  Then I realized I had to go up that hill again to get back to my car...  I readjusted my headphones, selected a song with a good beat and I started to walk.  It started with me just putting one foot in front of the other and it turned into me walking at a pretty good pace up the hill.  By the time I made it back to my car, I felt utterly exhausted but proud of myself too.  My walk was just shy of two miles and helped me get that much closer to my goal of 10,000 steps for the day.

After my excursion yesterday, I thought I might be able to have a little bit of a rest day today.  Not so much...  I started out first thing this morning as the substitute belly dance instructor in a nearby town. This class is always a lot of fun to work with and today was just as much fun as the other classes I've taught for this particular dancer.  I had a total of six ladies in my class and they each approached me after the hour and a half class to tell me how much fun they had this morning.  A few of them even asked me when I would be back to teach again because they enjoyed my class so much!  That made me feel really good.  =)

Once class was taught, I headed to church to sing in the choir and then had an errand to run.  By the time I got home though, I had it in my head again that I needed to go walking.  Yikes!  Am I turning into one of those people who feels the need to work out?!  Oh, the horror!!  =)  After walking up the 'mountain' yesterday, I opted to walk today where the ground was more level.  Not far from the studio where I dance, there is a big lake (which is by the ocean) which is where I decided to walk today.  I ended up walking around it twice and it was just about two miles.  This weekend was actually the first weekend since I bought my activity tracker that I was able to 10,000 steps both days of the weekend.  Up to this point, I have been able to manage 10,000 steps each day during the work week but not on the weekends; this weekend was different.  Granted, my knee is not very happy tonight but I'll survive.

I'm hoping that my knee will feel better tomorrow since I have a full upcoming week at work (the next two weeks actually).  It is that time again for spring break and the kids here actually get two weeks off of school.  Since they're out of school, that means my building will be open from 7 am - 6 pm for the school-age children.  We have a fun theme planned (we're doing our own version of the Olympics) and I'm hoping the kids enjoy the things that we have planned.  I have been trying to find time each day to leave the building and, if nothing else, walk around the block.  I think I will definitely try to find time during the Olympics to take those "sanity walks" as I've been calling them.

I'm working on not becoming obsessed with walking or working out but I know that's easier said than done.  I know it's good for me to be working out and getting out there and doing something for me.  The trouble is, I often burn out because I focus on not seeing immediate results.  I have been reminded before that I need to realize that it took time for my body to get to this point and it's going to take time to accomplish the goals I have set for myself.  I just don't want this to end up as one more time that I quit working out because of time.  I have to keep reminding myself to just take it one day at a time...

Well, my dear readers, since I had a pretty physical weekend and have to get up early for work tomorrow, I should probably bring this to a close for tonight and think about heading to bed.  I hope you have a fabulous week, my dear readers and I hope to see you back here next week!  =)