[2023-01-30] The pleasure zone
A month ago, my daughter and I started doing a 30-minute workout two or three times a week, using a video she had found online. The weather was crappy, making our walk a non-starter, so when Mel suggested an indoor workout, I was on board. The first video she picked was just right, like Goldilocks choosing the perfect bowl of porridge right off the bat.
The intensity of this particular routine is ideal—not so hard as to leave us winded and incapable of bantering during the half hour, not so easy as to leave us feeling bored. The movements make our bodies feel good, both during and after the exercise routine, without causing aches and pains the next day. The video includes a 30-second countdown clock, which identifies how long each exercise will last, and a 30-minute progress bar, which indicates how far along we are in the session—both of which keep us motivated.
We have tried a few routines by the same instructor but have gone back to the original video, finding that it generates the most pleasure of the three we attempted.
The concept of pleasure in exercise came up in last week's newsletter by James Clear. He shared this excerpt from a blog post by Sarah Perry:
Unfortunately, most on-ramps to exercise are at an intensity too high for previously-sedentary people to find them pleasurable. If people go to a fitness class, or focus on running a particular distance at a particular speed, they’ll likely miss the pleasure zone entirely. Refocusing on exercising only for one’s own individual pleasure, as slowly as one prefers, and only at intensities that are pleasurable, is more likely to motivate repeat and habitual exercising. At that point, the enjoyment of exercise pleasure can build on itself, motivating longer and longer intervals of experiencing the pleasure.
Sarah Perry's quote perfectly captured our experience. Mel and I do the exercise routine in the privacy of our home, not worrying whether we're "doing it right" or whether we're completing as many reps as the instructor. We can be goofy, throwing in extra moves to better align with the beat of the music. We can talk while working out. It all makes for a very pleasurable endeavour.
I experience the same pleasure in learning Brazilian Portuguese. Each night, after I publish my Jenesis post, I snuggle up in bed and play Duolingo. It truly feels like play. Like our exercise routine, Duolingo strikes the perfect balance between pleasure and challenge: I get the answer right way more often than wrong, which makes me feel successful. To borrow a metaphor from Sarah Perry, Duolingo gets the on-ramp to learning a language at just the right incline. The lessons are repeated frequently enough for me to learn a concept and apply it in different contexts, with enough curve balls thrown in to keep me on my toes. I've supplemented my language acquisition with other tools, keeping those that hit the sweet spot, and quickly dropping those that don't.
For any new activity, I strive to reach the pleasure zone—that place where the exertion produces feelings of enjoyment with just enough challenge to keep things interesting.
