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Slow Exercise Is a Form of Resistance
And yes, even slow, boring, inefficient workouts are good for you
As a millennial with much-higher-than-the-national-average student debt, I spent years managing feelings of disappointment, fear, stress, and even stretches of depression by engaging in intense exercise. I would run six quick miles at least three days a week, rapidly lift weights in as many boot camp classes as I could fit in, and zoom through vinyasas in hot yoga. Moving fast was a form of avoidance that still made me feel accomplished.
Eventually, I was forced to slow down when my knee, shoulder, and back muscles started flaring up. If I wanted to continue exercising, I had to stop jumping and sprinting and start walking, jogging, and practicing yoga in mild-temperature rooms.
It was an irritating comedown, but eventually, I began to understand that slow exercise — or what I think of as movement that doesn’t focus on speed, but on a mix of physical integrity and meditation — isn’t a compromise; it’s part of an entirely different way of moving through the world. Even though I’m now fit enough to engage in intense exercise again — and I do — it’s the slow stuff that helps me tolerate the bad feelings I’d typically try to push away.
If you can get in a workout that will chisel…
