Bottoms up! Side Lunge/Squat Combo

I love this move as a "finisher". It's a great combination of balance (stabilizers) and focus (gotta squeeeeze), and you can really feel it just where you want to.

Start with your feet together, and a light barbell resting on your shoulders.

Fig. 1: Take a big step to your left, putting most of your weight on your left leg, and straightening your right. Sit back so that your knee is behind your toe and the weight is in your heel.

Fig. 2: Push off your left heel and come back up to standing, feet together.

Fig. 3: Keeping your chest up and your weight in your heels, sit back as low as you can. Push your hips forward on the way up, squeezing the glutes. Repeat the lunge/squat on the other side. Do 3 sets of 10 - 12 reps on each side, with 1 minute rest between each.

...and yes, my fallback career is as a stick-figure artist.

Focus

New job, new home... a new life, essentially. So, a new blog.

I hope to use this space to focus on my passion -- health and fitness -- and to post my workouts, nutrition tips (perhaps not always representative of what I'm eating!), fitness tips, and motivation. This, in turn, should keep me motivated to stay focused on maintaining and improving my own personal fitness as so many other things around me are changing.

Years (and years and years) ago, I was unhappy with the state of my body and my health. (This is not to say that I have been consistently happy with it ever since, nor does it mean that I am perfectly content with it now, but this was where it began.) I pulled out a cheap notepad and wrote a few sentences to keep in mind as I changed my focus. I kept this notepad by my bed for months; it reminded me what I was trying to do and why; it refocused me when I drifted; it reassured me that I would achieve my goal.

Fitness and health is not a discrete goal, defined by reaching a point, checking a box and being done with it, but an ongoing journey. I still repeat my motto when I slip down the slope to poor eating habits (though they're far from perfect at their best) and choosing the couch over an activity. But I also repeat it when I'm injured and resting a sore calf, when I take an afternoon nap, and when I take the time to savour foods from the top of the food pyramid.

I will be strong.

I will be fit.

I am doing this for me.