You are taking boot camp at the gym, or a yoga class, and the teacher tells you to hold a plank. Maybe you are in your living room, holding a plank for your plank a day challenge.
You are determined to hold plank longer than you did the day before!
You want to make it to three minutes, or to four minutes, or whatever arbitrary time you have set for yourself. Having a goal makes it easier to withstand the discomfort that arises as you hold the posture for sustained periods of time.
You are holding the plank the best you can as you try to stay in good form.
Your muscles ache but you but you keep going.
Beads of sweat form on your forehead .
Fatigue starts to set in.
You feel shaky.
And right before you beat your best time, you collapse. You‘re spent.
You may have held that plank for one minute, two minutes, or longer, but at what point did you stop breathing?
Did you ever notice that we tend to hold our breath at the most inopportune moments?
One thing that I see frequently while teaching yoga is that my students stop breathing when they are holding a pose. Ironically, yoga is all about the breath! Any yoga teacher will tell you that the most important aspect of your yoga practice is your breathing.
The other breath related fact worth mentioning, and of utmost importance to those in the fitness world, is that the breath will help you hold your plank longer, or perform any exercise more effectively, for that matter.
When you get shaky and your muscles begin to fatigue, it is because they are no longer getting an adequate amount of oxygen. Breathing will help keep your muscles oxygenated longer. The longer they can receive that oxygen supply through your breath, the longer you will be able to hold the posture.
When you hold your next plank, remind yourself to breathe!
Take it one step further and try to focus on your breath instead of the mental chatter.
The mental chatter is going, "I can't do this!" “I can’t hold this,“ “I’m weak,” “I suck,” blah, blah, blah…because that’s what our minds do.
So, quiet your mind and just breathe.
It's amazing what we can achieve when we get out of our own way.
Namaste, Divas!
©2012 Ilene Evans
Yesterday I made a point to breathe thru my plank. I always have to remind myself.
I have to remind myself too! But it makes a huge difference!
Your last line says it all – so often we are in our own way. I have to remind myself to breathe too while I’m holding plank. When I hold my breath, that’s when the shakes set in. Then I remember to breathe and it’s OK.
Breath is such a simple concept but one we all forget so easily! And about getting out of our own way – I have to remember that one for myself!
So funny that you said this right now. Just yesterday when I was in my plank, I had to remind myself to breathe for the first time. I had my head all cluttered and I wasn’t getting into my usual breathing pattern. I was totally thrown off. It really all comes down to breathing. It is something so simple and natural yet we fight it.
It is the natural inclination for most of us to restrict our breath during stress, whether it be emotional stress or physical stress from holding a plank.
Even though I wrote this post, I still have to remind myself to breathe all the time!