Work Your ABS Workout

Comments

1. Kathy says:

   May 11, 2011 at 3:34 pm

   I've been so busy, I haven't had a chance to read those links, but I wanted to respond a bit more in depth because I've thought about what you've said, and what my impression of yoga is.

   When I was a kid, I remember “yoga” being sitting in a weird cross-legged position with your heels on your thighs, saying “ommmm,” and that it was some Far-East religious thing, and that was as far as I knew. I didn't know that there were all sorts of poses, that it had to do with holding your breath, or anything like that. Throughout my teenage years and beyond, I've done several workout videos of various types (aerobics, walking, abs, leg-toning, etc.), and many of them have incorporated positions I would later see as yoga positions or moves. I'm not sure if the workout people intentionally got yoga positions, or if they just happened to use similar ones.

   For instance, the “goddess” position in the workout above is basically the same as “the plié position” (a ballet move) from the leg-toning workout I have which kills my legs with all the squats it tells us to do. The “half spinal twist” is used before and after the abs workout to help warm up or cool down the abdominal muscles. Most of the videos have synchronized breathing at least for part of it, as you warm up and/or cool down.

   When I've done these yoga/relaxation moves up to this point, it was in complete innocence — I knew it was based on some Eastern something-or-other, but knew nothing more than that. I never got into any religious, spiritual, enlightenment, idolatrous anything. Perhaps after reading the links, I won't be able to say that — and that is part of the reason why I wanted to respond more in-depth before reading anything that would challenge on it — so I could say this stuff with a clear conscience.

   My husband got the P90X workout series, and one of the workouts is a 90 minute yoga workout. I was never able to do more than about 30 minutes of it, before my hands and wrists just gave out, from all the push-up type hands-and-feet exercises in it. But what I did was very challenging, and helped me in my flexibility — which I already had a good bit of. To me, doing these exercises was no different from how I became able to do the splits. When I was about 16, I decided to do the splits, but of course, it took some time. Every night, I would stretch out as far as I could, and hold it for several seconds. It was uncomfortable, but I kept on, and every night was able to go a little bit further, and a little bit further, until finally I could do the full splits. The yoga moves I've done have been basically the same — just stretching exercises designed to challenge me physically until I could do what I previously could not.

   To me, there was nothing religious about it. As such, I can say at this moment, that it seems that there would be Christian liberty in this activity, since I do not see an evil in stretching and relaxing — just as in Romans, Paul said that there was nothing inherently evil in eating meat that happened to have been sacrificed to idols. The idols were nothing — truly nothing — so Christians who were grounded in God and Christianity were not worshiping idols by eating that meat; although the idolatrous Romans *were* worshiping idols through eating the meat. Same action; different hearts, different minds, and different outcome. I'm reminded of a verse in either Psalms or Proverbs that says, “The plowing of the wicked is sin”; and of the numerous times in both the Old and the New Testament when God basically said He was sick of the Jewish sacrifices, because of the vain and empty way they were made — not from the heart. God said that even the sacrifices that He ordained, that were done precisely in the outward manner He had prescribed, were not acceptable, and were even abominations (I think there's a verse that says something like, “he that offers a lamb/goat/calf as if he offered swine's blood”?), because of the rotten and false attitudes and pretenses that the sacrifices were being offered with. In the New Testament, Jesus excoriates the Pharisees for paying “tithes of anise, mint, and cumin, but omitting the weightier matters of the law…” So, it seems that the heart is more to be judged than merely the outward action — for good or for bad — and I can say that my heart is pure in this matter.

   I will read what you've linked to, and I may change my current attitude, but I don't want you to worry that I'm going off the deep end.

   I had not heard about “yoga” meaning “a little death,” and it is in one way disturbing to me; and yet in another way is fascinating to see how Satan counterfeits true religion to fashion into a false religion. “Dying to self” is not inherently bad — in fact, it is to be a constant with the Christian — Paul said, “I die daily”; and “I buffet my body to bring it into subjection” — literally, “I beat myself black and blue,” if I remember correctly; and we are to “take up our cross” [an instrument of death] and follow Christ, etc. But that is dying to self in order to become more like Christ, not to become one with false gods. I won't go into other counterfeits that I see in the world; but will just suffice to say that, in general, whatever God has ordained, set up, established, loves, promotes, etc., Satan will try to knock down and do away with, one way or the other — sometimes by a frontal assault, and other times by a sideways measure.

   At this moment, I can still separate yoga exercises from religion, because they're nothing more to me than deep breathing and stretches; but I can see that to other people, who do not have a firm foundation on the one true God, it can be a religious experience, and they can move from simple exercises into false religion.

   Again, thank you for your concern — “faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.” (Not that your words wounded me — but even if they had, you would be justified in saying them; I would be a fool to ignore well-meaning advice from a fellow Christian.)
2. mamabellydance1 says:

   May 26, 2011 at 9:28 am

   your ab work and shimmy are wonderful! Lovely.

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