The meaning of the word fitness to majority of women
from Tamil Nadu, India and Sri Lanka astonishes me. I have been fortunate to
interact with women from various age groups and an interesting thing I inferred
from most of them was their definition of fitness – merely losing weight for an
important occasion! It may come across as odd and funny to many reading this,
but is extremely interesting for me to think of ways to change the perception of
fitness that women seem to have back at home.
As a kid, I did not know what it meant to eat healthy
and make physical exercise a part of my daily routine. Interestingly enough, initially
even I became fitness fanatic only because I wanted to lose weight. Being a
food-lover, I feasted on all the delicious food available when I went to India
to study engineering. After six months of being there one day it became plainly
clear to me that I had become much heavier than I was. This made me desperate
to lose weight. I shed all the extra pounds, but thankfully, did not stop
there. I started reading fitness magazines and learning about different ways to
get a good workout. This thought process became an obsession, and therefore an
indispensable part of my life.
But what surprised me is why women in Tamil Nadu and
Sri Lanka merely see working out as losing weight for an event such as their wedding.
They work out and diet extremely hard, till the biggest day of their lives –
‘The wedding day’ and get back to the business of eating and becoming fat almost
immediately after. I have always wondered, should working out not be a part of the
routine? Should it not be something you enjoy doing every day, or almost every
day, rather than for the sake of achieving a trivial goal and then forget all
about it?
Since this topic has always intrigued me, I decided
that in the near future I would come up with an entrepreneurial venture in
India, where women could come to work out because they enjoy exercising and
being fit, not because they are merely supposed to or have to. It is funny how
my friends decide to exercise only if they have nothing else to do. I can’t
help but think, shouldn't it be a part of lifestyle instead. I realized the
perception was not because of the place they lived in, but because of the
concepts and wrong notions embedded in their minds as kids. For example: I am
currently training for a half marathon. There are days when I have had so much
work to do, yet I decide to go for a run. It surprises me how my friends end up
saying statements such as – ‘Should you not prioritize your time? Is losing
weight important or preparing for an interview? Why do you have to run? Why are
you wasting time? Well, little do they realize, my running has nothing to do
with losing weight. Moreover, working out is probably as important to me as my sleep.
I need it to let my body function well, stay fit and honestly – enjoy my ‘me’
time with no distractions.
I would like to apply the different concepts and approaches
we learnt in class to find answers to my question. Firstly – in this scenario
my persona would be women between 22 and 60.
The most important thing for me would be to try and understand what
fitness means to them. To me it is part of my everyday life which keeps me
physically healthy and mentally focused. It is not a short term goal, rather a
lifestyle choice. One possible reason I found out through my research was –
lack of education on the significance of exercise. Next, I would learn about
current means women have available to work out, and try to understand why these
are not good enough. For example, having the same exercise routine for a 50 and
25 year old makes absolutely no sense to me.
‘Professionals should consider developing fitness
programs for people of retirement age. As club chain has knowledge and use
latest technology, help should be taken to educate new users on new trends.’’ –
International Indexed Referred Research Journal
So the goal of my paper is to find out the root cause
of majority of women in Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka thinking that working out is
to lose weight for an occasion. Secondly I would like to research on existing
methods of exercising and come up with an innovative way of exercising back at
home and hopefully change their perception about exercising and physical
fitness. Hopefully one day I’ll be able to implement this idea and make more women
interested in the fascinating world of fitness.
Hi Ramya - The topic of this is very interesting and makes me think about a time in the U.S., when I was much younger, before or as the fitness craze was really hitting here, especially among women. Back to the first day of the Jane Fonda workout, Jazzercise, Richard Simmons (have you heard of any of these), the perception of exercise changed dramatically among U.S. women. I wonder if there is a way to examine this to understand the shift, either from a recent article that looks back or an article from back then. You'll definitely need to think through how you might want to organize this paper, but there is a really good topic here. Are you planning to conduct primary research, then, and speak with women from back home? Let me know how I can help you.
ReplyDeleteI forgot to say that, on your blog, I would have liked to see you explore the paper topic a little more, although the background on why this is interesting to you is really good.
ReplyDelete