Items

• 
  2020-03-16

  Focusing on Physical Health During the Pandemic

  The COVID pandemic of 2020 affected many lives including my own. For me, it greatly affected my ability to focus on my physical health. When we were all sent home from school to finish our semester online, the gyms closed. This drove a wedge between me and where I wanted to be physically. While I could still do calisthenics at my house, I was unable to do the heavy weight training that I had grown so accustomed to. This caused me to lose some of the muscle mass I had spent so much time trying to gain. Not only that, I also lost the one place I could go to be alone with my thoughts. While I’m at the gym, I can focus on problems inside my mind while also making myself stronger. I don’t have to deal with any unnecessary external interactions with others while I’m at the gym. While I was at home, I would sometimes find myself being irritated by my family with nowhere to go. During these times, I would end up going outside or locking myself away in my room. Since I had nowhere to blow off the steam, I could only sit there and let the irritation manifest into anger. While calisthenics were good for my physical shape, they did not help me the same way heavy weights did. To fix that issue, I took up boxing with two gloves and a small yoga mat. I put the mat up against the wall and began teaching myself how to box. This was helping. While I had to deal with the occasional interruption by my family, I finally found an activity that helped me effectively blow off steam. Still, I always knew that none of this was going to last. I knew I needed to get back into the gym in order to feel like myself again. Much like many others, I waited until the day when mine reopened again. When my gym reopened, I considered the pandemic to finally be over in my eyes.