A few months ago, my therapist confessed to my fear of bags. not mine HealerTherapist (I talk to her about other concerns) My physical therapist, whom I see periodically just to observe a slight old injury. I am not afraid of bags as my dog is afraid of bags. No, my fear is different. specific.
I can vividly picture it: I, on a plane, idly pull my suitcase but fail to lift it high enough to push it into the overhead compartment, trying not to crash into the seated passengers who were watching me, a growing predicament of people behind me, all swearing at me for causing In a traffic jam in the lane.
This is not a hypothetical scenario. It’s happened countless times, and I knew when I realized that my PT if I didn’t make a change was going to happen again soon. I had a new book coming out and the tour books looming on the calendar. It’s time to set a goal, albeit a modest one: to be strong enough to carry a suitcase with confidence.
A new manifestation of old insecurities
What my bag problem boils down to, my Healer– Perhaps the therapist would say, it is the fear of humiliation that stems from childhood shame. You will be right.
I used to make fun of myself as a kid in gym class, joking about my pasta arms and stick legs, but I was cracking those jokes to cover up the embarrassment. During soccer drills, I hid behind my classmates, speeding to the back of the class so I wouldn’t have to take my turn to kick the ball poorly, which only rolled halfway toward the goal. When I hit the volley, I floated gently forward, falling to the ground in front of the net without any of the explosive momentum my classmates seemed to easily provide. If we were asked to do twenty push-ups, I might run three or four before I collapsed face first on the dirty gym floor. The coaches used to yell at me because I didn’t try. “me Morning I try,” I always said, closing my tears.
What was my problem? Nothing, or at least not medical. Genetics gave me a thin frame; And when I found that I wasn’t enjoying any of the activities that might have developed my physical strength, I simply didn’t. While the other kids were racing across the monkey bars at recess, I sat on the floor, writing one-act plays for a bunch of acorns. I didn’t make any effort to develop my body as I got older, so the weakness problem only got worse with time. Little did I know, even a writer would someday need upper body strength.
A writer’s life doesn’t usually require heavy (physical) lifting.
Taking a tour to talk to readers is an important part of my job, a huge privilege, and a lot of fun. It’s also cumbersome in a way that it’s not normally practical. I spend most of my typical work day standing or sitting at a desk. I do decent cardio walking around my neighborhood, and my Pilates routine keeps my anatomy more or less consistent, but the heaviest thing I pick up on a regular basis is my laptop.
Atria Books
On my last run, three years ago, I learned that there isn’t enough Advil in the world to calm a body that is repeatedly trying to push its limits. I’ve also learned to never check my bag if I have a tight shift between connecting flights – that’s how you get to your destination without shoes and underwear. And while I did my best to pack the light, there is only one very effective that can be when packing, say, for six events in five different climates. Once, on a flight from Atlanta to Los Angeles, my suitcase slipped as I was trying to pull it out of the overhead bin, and it crashed and hit me hard on the side of my head. I saw the stars the whole time I was in LA, and I don’t mean the Hollywood type.
I’m much older now than I was then, let alone in practice. I want to enjoy this tour and focus on why I’m traveling — not whether I’ll end up lying on a sticky airport carpet, trying to smooth my back. I just want to be able to do my job.
Heidi Ross
My PT assured me that I didn’t even have to buy a set of weights. I use items from my store! So I opted for some light canned goods (15 ounces of low-sodium black beans per hand, to be exact) and started with a few reps of bicep curls and rowing motions. Every two weeks, I add more moves, gradually working up the overhead.
I had to learn to stop the comparison game
I don’t know if I would continue this exercise if I had to do it in a class about other people. At first, I was embarrassed by my little exercises. I had friends who could practice yoga handstands, support their whole body weight on their arms – and I was here trying to perfect the chest lift with canned produce? silly! I felt so bad about letting what should have been a perfectly healthy body go dysfunctional, as if I had wasted the good fortune of being a bodily in general. But soon enough, I had to pack up my bag with a plane full of people watching, and that scary reality kept me going. I remembered how I felt last time: the struggle, the impatient people waiting behind me, the feeling again that something was wrong with me for not being able to do what others were doing.
The only way to get where I wanted to go without injuring myself along the way was to make the trip a little bit at a time. As a writer, I’ve long known how frightening it is to wield an evolved power in full view of others. I often meet beginner writers who are too shy to share their work. They say, “It’s not good yet,” “Don’t laugh.” I will never laugh. I know how they feel.
I also know that whether it’s writing, exercising, or something else, there’s no point in copying someone else’s goal. The fact that my neighbor is training for a marathon has nothing to do with my ambition to lift a carry-on. My friend who’s attending an advanced class in French pastry is down a different path than I am now, trying for the umpteenth time to make banana bread that doesn’t fall apart.
My goal is my goal. Your goal is your goal. I may feel alone in myself, and you may feel alone in your loneliness, but in this simultaneous loneliness, we are together. And if we each focus on our own steps, no matter how small, we have a chance to make progress. There is nothing wrong with that.
I’m proud to say I’ve made my way from canned legumes to a cute pair of Chardonnays, and at the time of writing, I’m about to try doing my triceps juice with a small pair of weights I found dusty and neglected in the garage. Someone must have gotten rid of them, they are too mild to make a difference. They’d make enough of a difference for me.
Mary Laura Philpott’s New Book, Shelter from the Bombs: Time for Love and Other Explosives, It will be available on April 12, 2022 from your favorite bookseller. This article is part of a series highlighting the Good Housekeeping Book Club – join the conversation and check out more of our favorite book recommendations.
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