I’ve been lifting them, after increasingly long stints on the stationary bike. (Today was a half hour, which doesn’t sound long but a good chunk of that was on a high setting, simulating riding up an incline.)
Then the weights. I use pretty much every machine there, but I’ve come to pay attention to what the rest of my body is doing when I used them. For example, my breathing — I had to learn to exhale when exerting, ie. when bench-pressing. I had to learn to firm my abdominal muscles so that they would support the work that my arms and shoulders were doing. (And it really does help.) Then there’s stretching, the importance of which cannot be overemphasized.
I’m now at the point where I feel physically okay when I finish a decent session, even despite the (occasional, not constant) muscle pain. And emotionally, it’s a real pick-me-up: no matter how you’re feeling when you go there, when you’re done, you’re feeling relatively okay.
I can’t believe I’m really going to say this, but I’m also pleased that it’s warming up outside. I’m seriously considering putting myself on a daily hike regimen for a while — up and down Wonmi Mountain daily, no excuses save a horrid flu or some comparable monstrosity — and picking up a Dahon folding bike so I can (a) carry it on the train to places where there are bike trails and I needn’t risk my life to cycle, and (b) traveling in the neighborhood by going as directly as possible to the train tracks, and then following the backstreets that run parallel to the tracks… because the sociopathic drivers are much less common along those back streets.