Do you ever wake up some mornings and everything you do and see is clouded by a certain perspective? You look in the mirror and think you see that pie you ate in your hips?  You look at your closet and just can not find anything inspiring to wear? Everything you try-on accentuates the flaws you see?  This happened to me this morning.

I’m not sure what’s up with me today but during my morning routine including boot-camp , random fleeting thoughts of fatness and clunky-ness and awkwardness  filled my head.. Thoughts like these completely affect my ability to perform at my best.  I read a blog called The Clothes Make the Girl that calls this the “Phantom Roll” :

Yesterday at our post-Crossfit ring of fire challenge meal, fellow x-fitters and myself were discussing the strange quality of the “Phantom Roll” and how no matter how much weight you lose, the lingering discomfort of being bigger than you want to be sticks around….For a lot longer than it actually should. It’s a strange thing, and most of us feel like complete idiots for feeling this way. Numbers don’t lie. We are all blissfully more fit and stellar than we ever have been and yet, we glance in the mirror and still see our old selves. Obviously this behavior is not rooted in reality, it is reminiscent of an obsession into flaws that were present at one time; but while the actual flaws have lessened in intensity or disappeared all together, the knee jerk reaction to obsess about them is still there in full force.

Ok, problem has been stated, now what the hell do we do about it? I’m not really sure how to answer that question. Rather than bemoan feeling like a 15 year old, I’m going to spend some time and really solidify how fucking amazing I feel. If you feel amazing, you will look amazing, those two are inseparable. I’m hoping the rest will just fall back into line.

I enjoy reading her blog. She has a way of capturing things that you can totally relate too. And while I don’t do Xfit per se, I do find a lot of parallels in our fitness journey.

Following up on my post rest day performance at bootcamp this morning.  Having taken an extra day, I think it worked. I felt better overall and believe that it did show up in my workout this morning. Although it’s important to factor in the fact that I slept more than a lazy house cat these past 4 days off. So it is hard to gauge whether it was the extra rest day or the extra sleep in general.

A friend of mine told me this morning that I should try yoga on my 6th day of working out as opposed to the heavy cardio/weight training or a day of complete rest. Seems that I am missing that element of my overall fitness program. So I may give that a go to see if it makes a difference in my overall  fitness plan.

I want to make sure to not do hot yoga or power yoga to start off with. I have heard great things about both, but I think what I am looking for is just more basic yoga.

Do you have experiences to share about your “phantom roll” as Melissa calls it above?  What about Yoga? Have you found it makes your weight conditioning/cardio workouts that much better?