My Stamina Story
Me at the cardio peak of a Nia class, 2017
Stamina is the ability to sustain high effort for a long time. “High” and “long” are subjective. An activity that is easy for one person can be exhausting for another. Everyone is different. Also, we have different amounts of stamina at different times in our lives.
Even with those variables, stamina is important to maintain and increase, because sustaining high effort is what allows us to reach personal milestones and survive through difficult times. It is an important aspect of resilience.
Seeing stamina as a sensation gives you a big advantage in developing it. To me, stamina feels like heart and lungs pumping, face flushing, and energy buzzing through my body. While feeling those sensations, I choose to keep going. There is intentionality inside the sensation of stamina. I feel those sensations, and I intentionally choose to continue.
The advantage of taking such a subjective, internal, sensory view of stamina is that it allows me to notice and celebrate incremental progress. Frequent rewards makes it much easier to motivate myself to sustain high effort…towards any goal.
The pleasure and excitement of developing stamina was denied to me in childhood. All through school, I was unpopular, unathletic and uncoordinated. Always picked last for any sports team, I hated P.E. because it inevitably led to humiliation: people laughing at me, calling me names while I was running or trying to hit the ball. My hot face felt like shame. Breathing hard made me feel bad about myself. Consequently, I avoided sports and spent as little time as possible in P.E. class.
Then in my twenties, I was hiking in a beautiful sunny place with a good friend. As we climbed a long steep hill, my breathing got faster and my face got hot. There was no shade and I started feeling scared and bad about myself. I noticed that and wondered, why was I feeling bad about myself when everything was fine and nobody was being mean to me?
Good question. Why indeed? I realized I had developed an association between high physical effort with shame and humiliation.
That insight was the beginning of a slow but steady evolution from negative feelings about high effort, to positive feelings.
I became interested in folk dance, so my 20s and 30s were a whirl of colorful skirts and rhythmic bouncing - friendships made, performances enjoyed, great experiences had, all with pumping heart and a red hot face. I still felt insecure, but the pleasure of dancing was greater than my negative feelings. I did step aerobics too and was fortunate to have a wonderful teacher whose classes were so joyful, I accepted my hot face and beating heart as the price of such a joyful experience. I also kept hiking, and took up jogging and swimming.
Each activity brought its own unique sensations and benefits - and all of these positive exercise experiences helped me create new, positive associations with the sensations of stamina.
Then things really got better when I started taking Nia Technique mindful dance fitness at age 48. Nia teachers encourage participants to sense their bodies while moving. The classes were so joyful that the last of my childhood humiliation was finally healed - honeyed over by the joy of movement.
Today, as a Nia teacher myself, I actually love it when my heart beats fast, my lungs pump like bellows and I keep going. I especially love this feeling during class, where the floor is smooth and safe, the movements expressive and the music inspiring. I sense my hot face…and it has a smile on it, because of the joy of movement.
What is your stamina story? How do you feel, emotionally, during sustained exertion? Does it matter the setting, or who you're with? What experiences contribute to your emotional state? Tell me. I'm interested! (All stories kept private.)
