Obstacle Course

Working out is supposed to be a challenge.  We are setting out, on purpose, to give our bodies work to do.  We want to get breathless and tired and probably even a bit sore.  The goal is to make sure that the actual workout is the only hard part of the process.

That means we need to remove as many of the other obstacles that we can.  Different people will find different obstacles, but many of us share similar ones.

Time pressure is a big one.  I am big fan of planning as a way to reduce this one.  I believe in alarm clocks, getting out our workout stuff the night before, meeting a friend to work out or take a class so we have accountability, making grocery lists, and the like.  Maybe we need to do a little advance thinking about how much time we fritter away on things that don’t give us a lot of joy, like the fourth episode in a row of that show we’re addicted to, or the ninth funny cat video online (please note:  I’m not saying we don’t get joy from shows or cat videos, just that we don’t need to overindulge!).  We also might want to consider that the science suggests we will actually get more done in the long run if we invest time in our fitness—it makes us more energetic and sharper.

Some of us think of money as an obstacle.  News flash:  walking and running are free.  Sure, we can spend money on gym memberships and classes and personal training, and I am the first to agree that making an investment in health is worth it, but when money is tight, we can work out on the cheap using nothing but our own marvelous bodies.

Other people can obstruct our workouts, directly or indirectly.  When we have small children, sometimes we struggle even to get a shower, so a workout seems totally impossible.  The good news is that babies and toddlers love outings and, as mentioned above, walking is free exercise.  We may have a partner or spouse who is less than supportive of our fitness goals.  In that case, the first thing we need to strengthen is our backbone—we deserve to be healthy and strong and anyone who does not want that for us is not loving us the way we deserve.  Sometimes we can recruit the obstructive person to join us.  Sometimes we just have to do the right thing for ourselves, even if it is hard.

Then there is the part where we obstruct ourselves.  We may be afraid of getting stronger or more fit or thinner because it is a change and change can be hard.  Or we may know, intellectually, that fitness is good for us, but we don’t like it much.  In either case, we need to figure out what we want fitness for.  It is not an end in itself.  Maybe we want to be fit because we want to outlive all our relatives.  Maybe we want to impress the mean girls at the high school reunion.  Maybe we want to play with our puppy until the puppy is worn out instead of until we are.  When we find a real reason to work out, we’ll do it.

We can do this.