When my kids were small,
I was a stay-at-home parent. It was both
difficult and luxurious. I learned a lot. Some of it is even relevant in a fitness
context (unlike, say, my ability to read certain picture books in the dark).
One relevant skill was
meal planning. No one wants to go to the
grocery store any more than necessary with a toddler who might scream at any
moment. Making sure there was only one
trip in a week required some tactics.
Surprisingly enough, it also resulted in all of us eating better, more
varied meals and only the occasional resort to calling Blondie’s for pizza or
the infamous and popular yellow dinner (mac and cheese and frozen corn). If we want healthy, tasty meals, it makes
sense to plan them (and maybe even cook them!) ahead of time, when we are not
hungry, tired, and easily influenced by the idea of ice cream as dinner.
A useful principle that
emerged in multiple contexts was that some times worked better for getting
things done than other times. Afternoons
with cranky children were not the prime moments for tasks that required
detailed attention, but first thing in the morning we could do just about
anything successfully. That was our
rhythm; other people have different ones.
In a fitness context, the application is that we need to work out at the
times that work for us. Some people can
roll out of bed and pump iron. Others do
better after work in the evening or at lunch time.
Even after I returned to
paid work, meal planning and appropriate timing of tasks served us well as a
family and continue to work now. Let’s
do what works!
