It had been a year since I had left cricket, a sport that I pursued professionally and worked hard at for years. My daily routine of playing accounted for my fitness as the sport included running and a lot of physical exercise. But after I decided to work on my studies, within a few months I realized that I was starting to become unfit. I had gained some weight and found that my muscles were becoming weaker, and knowing that physical fitness is an essential part of overall health and well-being, I decided to use CAS as an opportunity to regain and improve my Stamina and Strength through a multitude of exercises.
LO1: Before I began the experience, I saw that I was good at abiding by the exercise routine due to my years in Cricket and Football, and that physical work would not be overwhelming for me. On the other hand, I did not have a lot of knowledge regarding specific exercises that could improve my Strength and Stamina, for which I would need to consult a physician first.
LO2: After consulting a physician and developing a plan, I realized that incorporating the exercise routine into my daily plan was challenging as a lot of tasks apart from exercise needed to be completed. For this, I saw it an opportunity to develop my time-management skills and become more productive on a day-to-day basis. Creating a balanced lifestyle that incorporate both physical and academic elements to allow for growth also required a lot of work and helped me improve my self-management skills.
LO3: To begin the CAS experience, I consulted a physician to create a plan for me to fulfill my specific exercise requirements. I want to be lean and fit, have greater stamina and strength, and hence, we were able to create a complete plan with particular exercises, their repetitions, and the time duration for which I needed to do them. This was also accompanied by a few essential foods I needed to eat to meet my increased demand for carbohydrates and Protein. From there on, I created a Spreadsheet that included a timetable for my daily exercises, so I could truly have enough time to complete this CAS experience. This planning proved to be the difference between a successful and an unsuccessful CAS experience.
LO4: At first, I felt that it was going great. I was able to complete my exercises religiously and was satisfied with the daily progress I was making. But then soon after my summative assessments and examinations came close, I felt the academic workload was overburdening and I started to lose my interest and consistency with the plan. But knowing how important this is for my physical health in the long run, I wanted to somehow keep it going, so I restructured my daily plans a little bit, and committed to daily exercise due to which I was able to continue the experience for a longer period of time, from which I can already observe the benefits I received.
Hence, through this CAS experience, I was able to incorporate physical exercise into my daily schedule and worked toward a healthier lifestyle, thus becoming a more Balanced individual.
