Fitness 19: Rialto

Hot or Cold? The Benefits of Both Kinds of Showers Showering is an essential part of a healthy routine, but depending on the temperature, your time spent under the water can offer different benefits. Whether you like it hot or prefer it cold, learn how your showering routine can affect your health. After reading, you might rethink which way you turn the dial. Some Like It Hot... Hot showers can relieve tension and soothe stiff muscles. If you have a powerful showerhead, even better! Let the hot water work like a minimassage on your shoulders, neck, and back. Studies have shown that taking a hot shower can amp up your oxytocin levels and ease anxiety. Anyone working with stress can use more of the love hormone in their life! A hot shower also acts as a natural decongestant to relieve cold symptoms, since the hot steam moisturizes nasal passages. Some Like It Cold Cold showers as unbearable as they are are actually really good for our bodies! Turning your shower cold for the last five minutes can help shock your body awake. This instant change in temperature relieves your body of fatigue and increases your mental alertness. A cooler shower (around 68 degrees) for two to three minutes once or twice daily is recommended by researchers as a treatment for depression. Just make sure you check in with your doctor before testing this out! On the more vain side of the spectrum, cold showers are better for our hair and skin. Where a hot shower can dry things out, cold showers hydrate and help with split ends and dry skin.

The 1 (Simple but Challenging) Step to Becoming a Runner It took two years, approximately 400 miles, a half-dozen running shoes, one 5k, one 15K, and four half-marathons (well, three and one-thirteenth half-marathons) before I finally said to myself, Wow, I’m actually a runner! Reading that back to myself, I realize how ridiculous it sounds but that’s the honest to goodness truth. I’ve been putting up absurd blocks and making excuses as to why I’m not really a runner.... I’m not fast enough. I only run half-marathons, not full ones! People are way better than me. I don’t even have good form. I don’t wear ‘serious’ running shoes. I’m not competitive. I could never qualify for a ‘real’ race. I don’t even have a runner’s body. I’m not good at sports, and I’m technically not an athlete. The reasons were endless. I remember hearing the famous Bill Bowerman quote, If you have a body, you’re an athlete, and thinking, that absolutely does not apply to me. I’ve never been good at sports, I was too intimidated to try out for cheer or dance in high school (I never had lessons, so how could I possibly be good enough?), and I’m completely noncompetitive. Slow, out of shape, uncoordinated, with zero interest in watching sports compound all that with exercise-induced asthma, and you have yourself an actual antithesis of an athlete. Or so I thought. As it turns out, you don’t need to meet any sort of expectation to just be a runner. Spoiler alert: all you have to do is RUN. Those first steps? You’re a runner. It doesn’t matter how fast you go, or how far you go . . . you just have to GO! Honestly, I can’t believe it took me so long to realize it. Yesterday I ran my fourth half-marathon, and somewhere along mile one, the past two years of memories, training, races, and hard work (and possibly runner’s high) flooded in and it hit me Wow, I’m actually a runner! It’s just like the idea of having a bikini body. All you need is a bikini and a body, and then, boom: bikini body. Want to be a runner? Go for a run. That’s it. That’s all there is. Have you been in this situation? Holding yourself back, denying your abilities? For me, the block was entirely mental: no one needed to tell me I was a runner, I didn’t need to hit some mark, or set some record, or qualify for Boston I just needed to believe I was a runner. Or rather, believe I AM a runner. I’ve been a runner this whole time! Feels pretty amazing to say that and mean it for the first time. At the risk of sounding like an inspirational cat poster, you’ve gotta believe in yourself! You ARE a runner and you ARE an athlete, no matter what your level! Love yourself and embrace your abilities, regardless of where you are in your journey.

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