May is National Physical Fitness and Sports Month, and here at the FoodPlay blog, we’ll be celebrating by letting our staff share their own personal fitness stories.
As our FOODPLAY troupes travel the country, charged with the task of empowering our nation’s children to take charge of their own health, so do we here in the FoodPlay office strive to practice those messages in our own daily lives.
The path to physical fitness is often quite personal. What works for one person may be entirely irrelevant to the next, thanks to any number of factors—from age and health history to more practical concerns, like simply finding the time to take care of ourselves amidst the general chaos of our working lives. With all of that in mind, I’ve asked some of our staff to bring you their stories—not as any kind of rubric for personal success, but rather in the hope that they may provide some sense of inspiration and camaraderie for any of you who may be facing the same challenges or enjoying similar triumphs.
First up is Hanna Bliss, FoodPlay’s Program & Media Coordinator, with her personal story, I am a runner. Don’t miss her thoughtful entry, and be sure to check back for more!
For more on National Physical Fitness and Sports Month, visit fitness.gov.
Without coaching, it’s difficult to sustain a primal fitness plan safely and effectively long-term. I began to understand this first-hand at the recent MovNat training seminar I attended. People don’t necessarily move well naturally unless they have been coached to do so – even if the movements are labeled as natural (like walking, which is a perfectly natural human activity). Our bodies are wired to find the most effective method to accomplish a physical task, even if it isn’t an efficient expression of that movement. This is great from a survival standpoint, when we may need to do anything it takes to accomplish a physical task quickly. For lifelong training, however, this isn’t ideal because a “natural movement” can be naturally good technique, or naturally bad technique. Over time, poor technique will lead to inevitable problems.