Browsing Category: Fitness

Tips for returning to the gym after a (long) break

January 4, 2018 Zoe

I will confess, I was already a gym slacker before I got pregnant. I wasn’t going as often as I used to and was generally looking for a change. Then I spawned a person, and at my very first doctor’s appointment, I was told that I couldn’t lift heavy weights while pregnant. It was a disappointment, but also sorta a way of letting myself off the hook.

Fast forward 2.5 years, and I’d gained quite a bit of weight and hadn’t been in a gym for years. Sure, I did yoga for a while, and I was constantly carrying around a 10kg (22lbs) human, but I was out of shape. When we moved into our new, awesome home, we joined our local gym and I returned to weightlifting at last. I’m still in the early days, but I’ve learned some important things. Continue Reading

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3 Comments Fitness, Health

2017 – How I achieved my goals

December 19, 2017 Zoe

At the beginning of the year, I set myself three main goals. I figured three was enough, that I didn’t need to strive for a million different things, and wow, three was more than enough. But seeing how I achieved my goals, I’m still pretty proud, especially considering how massive my main goal was. The three things I was striving for were:

Emigrate to the States
Feel like myself again
Reconnect and grow

Yeah, I was rather ambitious. But I think I was fairly successful. Continue Reading

4 Comments Fitness, Rambling, South Africa, USA

2017 Goals Goals Life goals

5 reasons I love my Fitbit AltaHR

May 29, 2017 Zoe

A couple weeks back, I went to a lovely breakfast with the iStore. It was a wonderful morning of getting spoiled, complete with delicious food, and a gorgeous locale. It was for Mother’s Day, and the PR team went out of their way to make us feel special. Everything about the event was fantastic – from the rose gold cutlery to the incredible goody bag. That’s right, we got amazing presents, too. It was such a treat. One of the presents was a Fitbit AltaHR, which I had wanted for a long time and instantly fell in love with. Now that it’s not just love at first sight, I thought I’d share a little bit more about why I like it so much.

First, though, can we all just pause and marvel at how beautiful this cutlery is? I mean, I don’t even care about rose gold in general, but this is really so damn pretty.

(Disclaimer: Yes, there are now some affiliate links in this post, but the content was written prior to that and is in no way influenced by the links. If you click on these links, I could earn a small commission.)

Comment Fitness, Geek, Products

Fitbit Fitness Wearable tech

What I learned from a month of daily yoga

February 1, 2017 Zoe

There are two people I need to thank at the very start of this post. The first, is the incredible Cassey Toi. She invited me to a yoga challenge at the end of last year, a month of daily yoga for January of 2017. I was honestly skeptical – I’ve never been able to stick with yoga, it has never gelled for me, and I didn’t know if I would like the woman making this series of videos. But I said yes, and I feel like my life is forever changed as a result. So first things first, hugest of thanks to Cassey for inviting me to join the #YogaRevolution – I never would have done it without you.

The second person I need to thank doesn’t know me and will probably never read this blog. But Adrienne’s series, Yoga Revolution, has helped to reshape my body and mind. Her emails were warm and inviting, filled with the deepest insights paired with the worst musical theater jokes. Her videos were the same, and exactly what I needed for each day of the journey. I have learned so much by doing yoga every day, and it’s a daily practice that I plan to continue for the foreseeable future. But why am I so grateful to these ladies? Well, my body and mind have changed so much in the past month, and it’s mainly thanks to the things I’ve learned with yoga. Here are just some of those things. Continue Reading

5 Comments Fitness, Health

2017 Goals Health Yoga

You can’t suck at yoga

January 16, 2017 Zoe

At the time of writing this, I have done 15 consecutive days of yoga. That is more than I’ve ever done before; I usually got bored and abandoned the daily yoga idea after a few days or a week. I find it so helpful to have great emails sent to me each day – a new routine, a new focus every day. It’s about more than the physical; the emotional and cognitive journey has already been profound. Even so, I was wondering if I’d stick with it once the month was over. Would I continue to find videos? Would I keep enjoying it without the daily changing routine? Parts of it are still so daunting. I struggle with many of the regular poses (like downward f-ing dog) and finish the 30 minute videos dripping with sweat. With some poses that I can only do while heavily modified, I sometimes feel like I’m not strong enough, not flexible enough.

I recently caught up with my friend Sadaf, and she commented that she saw that I was doing yoga now (she has for years). A part of me didn’t feel like I was good enough to be considered in the same league as I imagined she was in. I replied, “yeah, but I sorta suck at it”. She laughed and made the best possible comment. You can’t suck at yoga. It’s only once it came to the West that we started making it a competitive thing somehow, trying to be able to push ourselves into ever more complicated poses, outdoing the person on the next mat. It’s not about getting into the “perfect” tree, chair or crow pose, something that is mirrored in what the woman running the #YogaRevolution often says. Continue Reading

5 Comments Fitness, Health

2017 Goals Fitness Yoga