“Am I happy or in misery? Whatever it is, that girl put a spell on me.” – Jimi Hendrix
I hate to go to parties. No wait, I was being too easy. I despise parties. Why? I can’t stand small talk. It makes no sense. Someone will ask you about yourself, yet they don’t give a crap about you. While you talk, they try to think of something about themselves. Maybe something they think I’ll care about. Guess what? I don’t. Turns out, I have to go to parties and social events. The fact that I’m on this planet as a human being, I feel it’s important to socialize with other human beings or else I’ll cease to exist or become the Unabomber. I’m not sure, but I think those are the only two choices. The one thing I have noticed about socializing is how everyone loves to fluff up who they are. For example, no one will tell you they collect garbage at a party. They would pump it up and say they are a sanitation engineer. Los Angeles is famous for this. Everyone seems to be a writer, director or producer. There is a story that goes around that a guy kept telling women he was a director because he wanted to get laid. Two things happened. One, he got laid. And, two, he actually became a director. I think people are amazed when they ask me what I do for a living. The reply is, “I ride a bike.” I usually get a perplexed look. They usually reply with, “Oh, are you a pro, like Lance Armstrong?” I say, “I’m a pro, but the difference between Lance and I is he’s fast and I’m not.” I simply teach people how to become better riders and I get paid for it. I told you that to tell you this. When people find out I’m a fitness trainer, the quizzing begins. What do you think about circuit training, kickboxing, high-impact aerobics, krav maga, Boot Camp, etc. I always give the same answer, “It’s all good as long as you do it.” But there’s one that I get that I have a different answer for…yoga. In my opinion, yoga is not physical activity. Oh, it’s physical. You have to put yourself in pretzel-like positions. I’m a big fan of flexibility. At 48, I’m still able to do splits. But make no mistake, this is not physical activity. The key word in physical activity is activity. In order to stretch a muscle, you have to be the antithesis of active. You have to be relaxed. Is yoga an activity? No. In my opinion, it’s the equivalent of getting a massage. It will do absolutely nothing to increase stamina or aerobic base. It will cause little or not muscle hypertrophy. It will simply make you limber and supple, which in its own right, is a plus. But for those of you who will write to me and say, “But I sweat every time I do yoga, therefore it’s physical.” Think again, I sweat when I forget to turn on the air conditioning before I go to bed.
For your enjoyment, watch this snooze fest.
