Day 40: Pushing Pause

There's a lot of talk about "Pushing Play" in P90x. If you just get up, push 'play,' and do the exercises, you'll be in the best shape of your life. Fair enough.

But recently, I've been finding myself pushing "pause" a little more often.

Most of the workouts are about an hour and short water breaks, from 30 seconds to a minute, are peppered throughout the sessions. Tony Horton, the taskmaster, encourages participants to hit pause if they need a longer break. The first few weeks I refused to push pause. But recently, I've been doing it more because I need a slightly longer break. But I think this is a good thing.

I'm able to do the exercises more vigorously and more completely. Therefore, I'm putting out more effort than I did in the past and I'm sweating like a corporate executive during a 60 Minutes interview. For that reason, I'm a little more spent during the workouts.

I don't pause the workouts for more than an extra 20-30 seconds, but in many cases that extra break is all I need to keep going.

So, definitely push play each day. But don't be afraid to push pause.