The tense topic of stretching

Photo via breakingmuscle.com

I would consider myself a pretty active person. I am a kickboxing trainer, I bike, I play volleyball, I rock climb, I kayak. You name it, I have probably done it if it is an active sport. My biggest problem is that these are all get-up-and-go activities. If you’re also involved in active sports like these, then you might know what I go through every time it is suggested that I stretch before I start.

Ah, stretching. The most seemingly unnecessary waste of time holding you back from getting your groove on. What we really fail to see sometimes, though, is that stretching is the key to physical progress and being physically capable to do all these active activities that we love.

I’ve heard it time and time again, “Oh no, I don’t need to stretch. I never get hurt. I’ll be fine,” Alright, you may be fine now, but 20 years from now, your body might not feel the same way.

What happens when we don’t stretch? Well, at first, nothing. We get to go along with our workouts carefree and quickly, unworried about injury. We’ll see progress and get stronger or better. But one day, we’ll be sitting at our desk in the office and end over to grab that paperclip that just slipped off the desk when suddenly a shooting pain stings your lower back. Could blame it on age, could blame it on just twisting it funny, but these painful muscle pulls and tears can be prevented. How? Stretching.

Imagine your body as a rubber band. When you work out, your rubber-band-body is strung tightly around a stack of notecards, tensing to keep them together. If you were to leave that rubber band wrapped around that pile of paper, eventually the rubber would become brittle and snap. This works the same way with the muscles in your body. If you continue to exert force with your muscles for long periods of time without proper stretching, then your muscles, too, will become brittle and stiff, causing injuries.

I don’t know about you, but I really dislike being injured – even more than I dislike sitting around stretching and waiting to do something active that I love. It is important, though, to get those muscles nice and loose before I get my head in the game. By stretching, I am allowing myself the opportunity to workout to the best of my ability and giving my body what it needs to help me do what I want to do. Yes, stretching can be hard and boring, but instead of sitting there and thinking, “Gosh, I’m so tight,” or “Ugh, this is such a drag,” tell yourself that you are respecting your body and taking good care of it by stretching.

Stretching will definitely be a staple in my workouts from here on out. I want to take care of my body so that I can do all the sports and crazy activities that I love to do. Taking the extra time to loosen up your muscles will keep you going. Believe me, I think it is worth the time investment.

What can yoga do for you?

Now that the fresh warm air of summer is surrounding us in Milwaukee, it is time to take advantage of the weather. The Marquette University Employee Wellness Program wants to help you out with that. We have created a summer-long outdoors yoga class right here on Marquette’s campus.

Yoga is a type of meditating physical activity that helps an individual strengthen balance and unity between the body, the mind and the spirit. Through poses and other postures, yoga has lots of mental, physical and spiritual benefits to offer. The best part of yoga is that it is basically an exercise of focused relaxation.

With a professional yoga instructor leading our classes, you would be surprised by the different long and short-term benefits that you will experience through this weekly practice.

Although yoga has handfuls of different benefits to reap, these are some of the pluses that I don’t think can go unmentioned.

Sleep better – Yoga allows you to hit the hay without the tension and stress from the day. Even a morning yoga session can help you sleep better the following night. The practice helps you clear your mind, manage stress and be able to all-over just relax more effectively. So if restlessness is a major issue in your life, make it a thing of the past wit some weekly yoga.

Calm stress through breathing – When the craziness of life hits the fan, it is easy to be so caught up in the intense moment that we let stress overtake our bodies. This wears us out and, honestly, I’ve never heard anyone say that stress feels good. Yoga has a unique way of teaching us how to focus on our breathing to stay calm and focused. Keeping up with focused breathing can help release tension in your muscles and also allow you to work more effectively.

Negate soreness – A good stretch helps loosen the body’s muscles and tendons. If you are sure to stretch often, especially through yoga, your daily activities and exercises can become less of a chore because they won’t have you feeling sore days on end.

Prevent injury – The number one way to get a muscle injury is going pulling or straining a muscle. These injuries are also really time-consuming to recover from and can put any active person on the bench for weeks. Yoga offers simple but multi-functional stretching techniques that allow your body to move with the exercise you are performing, rather than tearing at tight muscles. Yoga can also prolong the life of your joints by helping to loosen and stretch the tendons that hold your bones together. This helps you move more easily and with less resistance.

Clearly yoga really does not have much of a down side. To get involved in MU’s outdoors summer yoga classes, sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/outdoor-summer-yoga-registration-tickets-25680448914

Registration is open after the classes start still. All you have to do is contact Kristin Kipp at kristin.kipp@marquette.edu. The classes run every Wednesday from 4:45 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. starting June 22 in the green space by the Joan of Arch Chapel on Marquette’s campus. The last class will be held on August 10.