It’s 5:30am. My body is a sweaty pretzel.

It’s still dark outside, but I’ve already begun the day in pain. While my family is resting peacefully upstairs, I am silently debating whether life is worth living.

You see, I am exercising.

Oh, but not just any exercising. I am doing…(cue music as I cross my forearms) P – 90 - X!!! This is no “Sweatin’ to the Oldies” video, my friends. This is a twelve chapter, thirteen-week program designed to confuse your muscles with so many exercises that they finally just give up and grow. The sessions are so diabolically long that the fat simply gets bored and decides to leave.

Or so I hope.

For most people, P – 90 - X! is old news.

But I don’t watch much TV, so I’ve missed the many infomercials over the years. While on the road, I finally saw the commercial, did some research, and decided that, yes, this was what I needed to do to get back in shape again. As Tony the instructor says, it was time to BRING IT!

I haven’t always been in need of such radical help. When I turned forty, I started something called Body for Life. It was an ingenious program that combined workouts, eating well, and several thousand dollars of supplemental drinks, bars, gels and voodoo chants. And you know what? It worked. I got into the best shape of my life. I was pretty flabby at the time, too. See, I never lost the extra weight I gained from my wife having our children.

Body for Life worked. Had I not done that, who knows how many chins I’d have by now? Over the years, however, I started putting a few pounds back on, exercising a lot less. So, I knew it was time to make one last heroic stand to get back into shape. And that is why, this morning, I am on the edge of panic as I witness my body parts in positions they should never, ever be. Today’s torture is Yoga. But, not just ANY Yoga. It’s (cue music and cross forearms) YOGA X!!!

Yoga shouldn’t make you cry. Should it?

I always thought Yoga was a calming, mind-centering thing. But as my body slowly teeters and crashes to the floor, again, I’m fighting bursts of rage instead. As Tony places his hands into the prayerful “Namaste” position, I am SO tempted to place my own hands into a different position. One that universally does NOT mean prayer.

There’s no pausing in exercise!

Instead, I sigh, pull myself up off the floor, and try once again. I only have another…SIXTY FIVE MINUTES!!...to go. But I can’t pause the program, as much as my body cries out for respite. Why? (Here I will give you the most important health wisdom I have learned.) You must never, under any circumstances, EVER, exercise in front of your kids. I have to finish before they get up. Man, if they walked downstairs and saw me in these positions…they’d never stop laughing. Or throwing up.

Slowly, ever so slowly, I groan through one humiliating pose after another. Downward Dog, Vinyasa, Chatarunga, Crouching Tiger, Whimpering Man (that last one is my specialty). Until, blissfully, the “calming and peaceful” workout is done. I struggle to my feet. One more day to check off. Whatever joy this ancient art form gives to others has thus far been lost on me.

If my friends from India could see me now, they’d be choking on their Chai.

But wait! there’s more. More thoughts on living a Good life.