Class in Session: PiYo Live

This next session is hard, the instructor warned. I can guarantee that you will need to take a modification at some point or rest in down dog. And that's OK.

I have this thing – a complex, maybe – where I assume everything is about me. My boss gets called down to her boss's office, I fret that I'm in trouble. A friend doesn't respond to a text to me in minutes, I assume I've done something, something I don't remember, to upset her. I get a pedicure and I just know the nail techs are talking trash about me.

But, the truth is usually that my boss is doing administrative work, a friend is busy with kids and the nail techs are talking trash about me.

So I assumed that the PiYo Live instructor at the Y was addressing me when she said this. I had found my way to the class on a rare Saturday not spent running. I was obviously new, standing out among the regulars at this large, affluent Y. It was an intimate crowd as it was the holiday weekend, and I felt more self conscious for it. I could see my thighs thicken as I looked in the mirror, the print of my capris stretching against my quads. I saw my legs quiver through lunge after lunge as the others moved swiftly and strongly.

Snap.

Like that, I went from self conscious to indignant. This instructor did not know me. I am strong. I am determined. I am a bad ass. B-A-D-A-S-S. I was going to rock this section. She did not know anything.

Except she did.

My hips were tight, my core weak. (I almost raised my hand when she said she could tell the runners in the class because it was that obvious.) I was unfamiliar with the program, and the class tempo offered no forgiveness. I tried my best to keep up and to fight but I was cowering in down dog within two minutes. From then on, I resolved myself to the fact that it wasn't my workout and my dreams of falling in love with PiYo, running home to sign up for instructor training, were not meant to be.

Not yet, anyway.

Remember that determined thing? Well, it seems PiYo has laid down the challenge and I have accepted. I signed up for the Beachbody streaming free trial, which has a sample of PiYo (Cardio?), and my BRF Tami is going to lend me her DVDs to see if I like it as much as I want to and, most importantly, can carve the time for it.

I'm not a huge Beachbody person (I mostly hate the sales schtick) but the workout is a) one that could benefit me; and b) full of exercises that I'm not likely to do on my own. Also, Chalene Johnson is full of all kinds of inspiration. She sort of rocks my world.

Any PiYo lovers out there? Tips?