Beat the Afternoon Slump: 10-Min Walking Workout | 45

Brain buffering? Staring at your screen like it owes you answers?

This 10-minute indoor or outdoor walking workout is your quick fix for the afternoon slump. (Or any time you hit a slump.)

Bye bye brain fog | Focus reset | Real energy | Creativity bump |  A ridiculous story

P.S. You'll hear a bell halfway through. If you're walking outside, that's your turn-around cue.

Tap Follow/Subscribe so next week's walk is waiting for you.

Instagram/Facebook: @yourwalkingpodcast

P.P.S. I also get around to chatting about brain frogs, bikini waxing, my friend's Mini Cooper, and more. 

Transcript

Helen Ryan: 0:01

So if you're in the middle of one of those moments in the middle of the day or anytime of day where your brain just checks out, and when you're staring at your screen and you're waiting for something magical and mys mystical to happen, it's like you're in dial up internet hell, I don't know if you remember dial up internet, but I do. Yeah, those were the days and sometimes that's where our brain is. So today we're going to do a 10 minute anti slump power break walk. We're not going to go super fast, it's just going to be 10 minutes enough to get our oxygen flowing. We're going to start out at a warmup pace. Whether you're doing inside or outside. If you're inside, you can do this on an elliptical machine, a treadmill, walking pad, or just marching in place. And if you're outside, there's a bell at the halfway point, which many, many times I never bothered to tell you because I forgot and I thought you could just read my mind. And I am going to share with you a little bit a TMI story about where I fell asleep at the most inopportune moment. Because sometimes when we're in middle of a slump, nothing, and I mean nothing will keep us from falling asleep. Deep breath in through your nose. Really fill up those lungs all the way and exhale through your mouth. Start nice and easy. It's a comfortable pace. You're going to roll your shoulders. Loosen your jaw. Feel for any tense spots in your body. Unclench your hands. You are going to be light on your feet. Steady rhythm. Just warming it up. And try to get rid of our brain fog. Sometimes brain fog is really just, sometimes I say brain frog, but I don't have a frog in my brain, last time I checked, brain fog is really just lower blood flow. And so today, hopefully we're going to just refresh that blood flow to your brain, get that blood moving through your body. It's like hitting your refresh button. And sometimes just 10 minutes is enough to push the oxygen back up to your brain and then wake you up a little bit."Wake me up before you go, go." Hold onto your breathing now. Nice and steady. And movement is the fastest way to get your brain unstuck. So that's why I keep saying just go out for a little walk and a little oxygen goes a long way. We're going to add a little more oomph now, just a little bit faster. Not a sprint. It's just purposeful. Going to relax your hands. Keep those arms swinging. Keep your breathing steady in and out. Focus on the rhythm. Focus on feeling free. Okay, so here's a TMI story. And this is a true story. So one time I was getting a bikini wax and I fell asleep on the table. Now, you know, it's not the most comfortable thing, right? And so for me to fall asleep, you know, I had to be tired. It's not like it was a massage. So I am acutely aware of these slumps and how they can just overtake you, and that's why just getting out for a little bit is so refreshing and such a great idea. Get rid of that slump. Even if you're just doing it in your house and marching around, arms above your head, just something, whatever to keep you moving. Steady movement builds that energy that you can actually use. The kind that lasts longer than your latte, so it's not, you know, drink coffee and then crash afterwards. Another deep breath into your nose and exhale through your mouth. And within the first five minutes of moving like this, your stress hormones drop, which we can all use a little bit of stress hormones dropping, and just 10 minutes is all it takes to really move us from foggy to focused. Okay, we're going to pick it up a little bit faster. A little bit of a push, quick light feet, because this is a short walk. Going to pump those arms and stay relaxed through those shoulders. Check on that posture. Feeling your body moving and the fresh oxygen flowing throughout. And your brain's going to be happy, because right now it's like a laptop when it freezes. So this walk will be more like the control, alt, delete for your brain. You're going to reset everything. I don't know if you've noticed that, but resetting everything really seems to help. I reset everything. Like my mic was making these cracking noises and I was recording and I couldn't figure out what was wrong, and then I just reset my device and then boop. There you go. Finally the crackling noise disappeared. So we'll do a control alt delete for ourselves. Hold onto that pace. It's quick. It's not uncomfortable. Just enough to let you feel like you're moving. And if you're stuck on being creative and you just can't figure out what the next step is, this is a cool little thing I just learned, is according to Stanford, walking boosts your creativity by about 60%. So if you're stuck on a creative project, just get out there and go for a quick walk. Deep breath in again through your nose, and exhale through your mouth. Steady pace. Not too fast. Not too slow. Going to reboot our bodies. Reboot our brains. Your anti crash insurance. Make a note how you feel about it when you get home because that way it'll encourage you to keep going. Pump those arms. We're re oxygenating our brains. And back to the creativity. Have you ever noticed how you get your best ideas about mid walk? About midway through the walk is when you really feel those creative juices flowing. Roll your shoulders either backwards or forwards, and then roll it in the opposite direction. Drop the tension in your hands and your jaw let your arms just swing loose. It's not a fast pace, so they're just going to kind of relax and do their thing. Take a deep breath into your nose and let it all out through your mouth. See how fast he is 10 minutes ago. Hopefully after today's walk, your head will be a little bit clearer. Your energy's back. You didn't have to spend money on a latte and you didn't have to take a nap. Just needed a little bit of a reset. Slow it down a little bit, and whenever you feel like that afternoon slump comes on, or just before when you know the slump is coming, or it could be a morning slump or an evening slump, just get out there and do a little bit of a walk with me. Just keep that body moving. We are turning the stress off, turning the focus on. Not to be hokey. Turn that focus on. I wish it was that easy. Just like, boop. Okay. Focus mode entered. One of my spinners in class, she had a mini Cooper and sometimes I would ride with her to class and she had sport mode. And so sometimes when I was teaching a class, I would tell her, okay, Joyce, sport mode on! So we're going to do focus mode on. And no matter when you're listening to this, what time of year, I'm recording this in November, so you know the season of stress is coming up. So I just wanted to give you guys something to get out there and just clear your mind and take a minute for yourself. Put your phone on do not disturb. And you look at your entire day there's 24 hours you can find five minutes or 10 minutes just to do something for you. Just to get out there and move and get that fresh oxygen going. Slow it down again. Now, when you get back or when you're done, even if you're inside, just do a tiny bit of stretching, just a little bit. Your calves, maybe the front of your thighs. Breathe in one more time now for me. Deep breath into your nose and exhale through your mouth. And if this walk help, then tap, follow, or subscribe depending on where you're listening. And that way the next walk I have will show up automatically for you so you'll know it's there. You know it's ready. And I have some cool things coming up, which I can't tell you because maybe by the time you listen to this, those cool things are already out. But if you follow me on... what is it?@Yourwalkingpodcast on Instagram and Facebook. it would be really cool, if you're out there walking, if you take a picture of what you see or your shoes or something and you can tag it with the hashtag walktalkwithhelen, and then I can see what you're doing in your walk and you can reach me, you know, make little comments that way and we can connect more so we're not doing this all by ourselves. Slow down just a little bit more now. And I will here next time.