Krista Stryker Happy Monday, How intentional are you about how you spend your time? Maybe this is typical of getting older, but in the last few years, I’ve become increasingly aware of how quickly time passes — and how deliberate I need to be if I want to use it well. Of course, thinking about time forces …
Happy Monday, I have a mixed relationship with the holidays. I love what I do, and I don’t look forward to taking time off. I feel the most alive when I’m writing, training, or working toward goals I care about. I pretty much live by this quote by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, one of my favorite psychologists …
Happy Monday, If we’ve learned anything from the last few years, it’s that things don’t always go according to plan. And, unsurprisingly, this same lesson applies to our fitness journeys. Plans and goals are incredibly useful tools — they help us focus our attention and give us priorities to organize our lives around. Making a …
Happy Monday, One of the things I get asked about the most is whether I train with weights. The answer is: kind of. I’ve been training using mostly my own bodyweight for over a decade now. I like bodyweight training for several reasons: It’s portable! I love the fact that I can work out anywhere, …
“Welcome to the women’s jiu-jitsu rollathon,” Pete, the owner of the MMA gym announces, instructing us to line up by the wall by rank. Six months into training, I’m still a total newbie in the sport, so I head toward the back of the line. There are about fifteen of us — more women than …
Happy Monday, Logically, most of us know that any time we’re trying to get better at something, whether it’s fitness-related, learning a new language, or picking up a new musical instrument, our progress won’t be linear. Non-linear progress means we should expect brief spurts of improvement followed by long periods where we seem to be …
Happy Monday, “If you have a body, you are an athlete.” — Bill Bowerman I remember seeing this quote from the co-founder of Nike early on in my athletic journey and feeling it spark something in me. Could I really be an athlete? Up until that point, I’d never even considered it an option. I grew up …
I started crying on the way to my first jiu-jitsu tournament. It was the first time I was competing in the sport, and although it was an unofficial competition — a no-gi rollathon held at a local gym, nothing that will go on my record as a jiu-jitsu athlete — I was unbelievably nervous. While …
“Oof.” I let out an involuntary noise as my opponent, a nameless guy at least fifty pounds heavier than me, slams my legs down, baseball slides his hips to the opposite side, and pins me to the mat. The last of the air in my chest releases as he does so. Since starting jiu-jitsu …
Three months ago, after years of not understanding what the hype was about, I turned up at my first Brazilian jiu-jitsu class. I quickly became hooked. I’m not alone in my experience — people who train jiu-jitsu often become fanatics about it. Many end up training for years, decades even, — a feat that’s nearly …