Finding your exercise in Disguise!
We all want to feel great in body and in mind but what floats one person’s boat, can cause someone else to sink in despair! So it’s really important to find a form of exercise or activity that brings you, at the very least, a small amount of pleasure or, preferably, a whackingingly large amount of joie-de-vivre!
Some people like to run, pound the treadmill or do circuits of the gym and, if that ticks the box, for you, then that is fine and dandy. However, I have always preferred my exercise in disguise. Hence when I was younger, I preferred to chase after a selection of balls in a competitive manner but these days I have found dance fitness and other less competitive means of leisure!
As a former PE teacher, I know how hard it can be to persuade today’s square-eyed, fresh-air-phobic children to exercise or just simply enjoy the outdoors! I once worked at a Prep school in London where on the day of the annual cross-country event, anywhere up to 50% of the school population were mysteriously ‘ill’! So I decided to change it into a timed, team treasure hunt around Hampstead Heath and ….. it was a resounding success where some certain individuals were found to be capable of propelling themselves faster than a slow, apathetic shuffle!
I had found their exercise in disguise! This being the start of Treasure Hunt writing!
There is much talk these days about children not having the same freedom as we, their parents/grandparents had – they are not left to their own devices sufficiently and allowed to explore, take risks and just learn to have fun by themselves. I also believe that as we age, the majority of adults forget to factor some fun time into their day/week. Sometimes, we are almost felt to feel guilty to just enjoy ourselves and that we should always be using out time productively. It’s all part of today’s time-pressured society and I get sucked in just like everybody else, believe me!
However, I have ALWAYS loved to have fun and found myself organising numerous events for friends and families because I wanted to experience fun and adventurous type of activities that were just not available to non-children. And this, quite frankly, is plain WRONG! Nothing is better for minds, over-burdened by parental and adult responsibilities, than having a couple of hours a week of something that we really enjoy doing and that will totally focus our minds away from our daily grinds!
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