3 Tips to Honor Your Body During Exercise
What does it mean to adopt a body-honoring approach to exercise? So many of us approach exercise from a mental orientation, letting our ideas and beliefs about exercise and what we believe is healthy dictate the frequency, type, and duration of our movement routines.
It’s not as common to orient toward exercise from a somatic standpoint, one that honors how and when our bodies naturally desire to move. To factor in how we feel and what our limitations are any given day.
If you’re looking to integrate more body awareness into your exercise, here are three ways to honor your body as you move:
consult your body before, During, and after your workout
Before you engage in any type of exercise, pay attention to how your body feels.
What sensations are present?
How are your energy levels?
Where are you mentally and emotionally?
Does the exercise you plan to engage in feel good or would something else feel better?
Try to focus on what your body wants to convey, not what your mind believes it should do to be healthy.
As you perform this check-in, notice any resistance arising from your body in continuing with your planned style of exercise. If resistance is present, consider modifying your original plan to something that feels better from a body-based, or somatic, perspective.
During your workout, be present with your body’s experience as you move.
Adjusting your focus to your body while exercising might sound straightforward but if you find yourself thinking about your day or even listening to a podcast or music while working out, there’s a big chance your attention is really in the mental space and your body may be moving on autopilot.
See if you can reduce mental distractions and create space for your body to communicate with you.
How is your breathing?
How are your energy levels now that you are expending energy?
Are you in any pain?
Are you overexerting or not exercising to your full capacity?
Shifting your attention to your body while exercising creates opportunities to adjust your movements, intensity, and the duration of your workout in real time.
Notice where you may be overriding your body’s innate intelligence in favor of an idea you have about what you want to accomplish while exercising. See if you can drop outcome-based expectations, such as completing a set number of laps, repetitions, deadlifts, or postures, and instead tune into what your body wants to do in the moment.
If you are participating in an exercise class, notice any instances where your body wants to move differently than what the instructor suggests. Even if you don’t follow your body’s impulses during the class, this is valuable information about how your body wants to move.
Once you have finished exercising, check back in to evaluate your body’s experience.
How do you feel after your workout? Energized or tired? Nourished and restored, or drained and/or in pain?
To what extent were you in your head versus in your body?
What was your overall orientation toward exercise during your workout?
What, if anything, would you do to improve how you feel in your body during exercise during future workouts?
Over time these check-ins will strengthen your body awareness, allowing you to make more conscious decisions when it comes to movement.
And when you do choose to exercise with mental distractions, such as listening to something or being in a group setting, you will find it easier to pick up your body’s cues as you move.
allow your exercise to be dynamic
An exercise routine implies following a repeatable pattern practiced consistently, such as going to the gym four days each week, or swimming laps every day before work. Routines make our efforts easy to tracke, evaluate, and optimize for specific results.
However, most exercise routines and programs are designed for men's biology. Men have consistent energy levels day to day based on their hormones which follow the circadian rhythm. In contrast, women's bodies operate cyclically and don't function consistently throughout our lifetime.
Women's bodies are the most "routine” before puberty and after menopause. If you are currently in another stage of life, give yourself permission to not adhere to a rigid exercise routine, because doing the same routine day in and day out doesn't make sense for your biology.
Create opportunities for different types of movement at varying levels of intensity and know that what works for you today may not work in the future. Be open to changing things up when needed.
Ayurveda, the ancient Indian system for cultivating health and wellbeing, can be especially helpful in determining what types of exercise are most appropriate for your mind-body type as well as offering suggestions for how frequently to practice.
“If you feel disconnected from your body to the extent that you struggle to know what types of exercise are beneficial for you, Ayurveda can be an accessible starting point.”
Rather than a one-size-fits-all approach, where research (often conducted on men) suggests everyone should be doing 30 minutes of cardio a day or regular strength training, Ayurveda offers a more nuanced approach to determining the optimal type and intensity of fitness for each person.
If you are more in tune with your body and are also in your reproductive years, another option is to practice aligning the type and intensity of your activity based on where you are in your menstrual cycle.
Because women's bodies experience fluctuations in energy, metabolism, and hormones throughout the month, choosing appropriate exercises during each phase can be incredibly nourishing and supportive to your overall health.
If you practice yoga, this might look like doing fast-paced asanas during one part of the month and more restorative postures at a different time. Alternatively, you might practice high-intensity interval training one week and go for leisurely walks another.
honor how your body naturally wants to move
Our bodies know how they want to move. All we have to do is pay attention.
Just as our bodies communicate when we need to eat or when we need to rest, they also tell us which types of exercise feel good and which ones don’t. We don’t need to strictly adhere to standardized exercise guidelines but instead can simply consult our bodies.
If you are used to primarily living in your mind, you may habitually override your body’s signals. It may take some time to interpret how your body naturally wants to engage in exercise activities and other movement practices without your mind getting in the way.
If you feel disconnected from your body or struggle to interpret your body’s signals, somatic healing can offer a dedicated space to practice letting your body lead when it comes to movement.
By learning to track body sensations, such as impulses, urges, and vibrations, you will deepen your understanding of what your body is communicating in the present moment. Instead of moving out of habit, or choosing the same exercise routines on autopilot, you’ll be more equipped to discern how to choose exercises that are supportive of your body’s natural tendencies.
Somatic healing also offers the opportunity to play with unstructured and non-choreographed movements that arise based on how your body desires to move. How many times have you felt the urge to stretch your arms above your head or wanted to curl up into the fetal position but suppressed your body’s inclination to do so?
“We are accustomed to only permitting our bodies to move in routine and habitual ways unless we are either very in touch with our somatic signals or experiencing something so shocking that our body’s innate urges overcome our mind’s resistance.”
The more you practice honoring these innate desires to move in a particular way, the stronger your relationship with your body will become and the more you will build your awareness of what you need in every moment, allowing you to intentionally choose exercise that naturally supports rather than depletes.
