"I got transported through a worm hole..."

“I broke my leg,” is a good reason to skip a workout.  “I’d rather watch all nine seasons of Star Trek Next Generation,” is, well, less good (although T.R. seems to be surviving a summer of doing just that).  “I’d rather floss my teeth,” at least involves a healthy behavior, but it’s not very plausible, it probably won’t happen, and it doesn’t take long enough to justify missing an entire workout.  And that is assuming it isn’t being said in the sense of “I’d rather poke my eyes out with flaming spoons.”

We all have days when we don’t feel like working out.  We can make up excellent and creative excuses for ourselves.  Our Inner Sloth will happily loll around on the lounge chair with a fruity drink.  Or our Inner Puritan will insist that we have important work to do instead.  Or our Inner Brat will just have a tantrum and demand a toy.  (It’s getting crowded In There!)

But we can ask ourselves a key question or two to sort out the good reasons from the bad.  Maybe “Do I feel up to going out with friends?”  (This is a little bit like when Mom would tell us if we were too sick to go to school, we were too sick to ride our bikes.)  Or “Which will make me feel better, getting this spreadsheet done now or working out?”  Or “Would I brag about what I did instead?”  Find the questions that work.  We might skip fewer workouts.

Shiny, Captain!

It is renovation season in the neighborhood.  Houses sport new colors, yards display new drought-resistant flowers, roofs fly off and return stronger than before.  Even I pulled weeds and trimmed up the back yard.

On an even more local level, we can do some renovations.  Maybe it’s time to clean our body houses.  I am not a believer in “detox” programs; we have livers for that.  However, we all can do the equivalent of cleaning out the fridge, waxing the floors (does anybody do that anymore?), washing the curtains, and decluttering the closets.

Maybe it is time to turn that idea that we can’t do some particular thing into mulch.  Or time to recycle our outdated body image.  Or even stop reading about new fitness techniques long enough to try some.

What will make us feel new and shiny?

Heavier than all my weights put together

One of the reasons I exercise is that I have depression.  While I don’t keep my depression a secret, I don’t talk about it a lot either because it isn’t all that relevant in most circumstances.  Also, it’s challenging to explain.  I don’t walk around looking at my shoes and crying all the time.  It’s more like I have the worst teacher/parent/coach you can imagine living in my head telling me I suck all the time.  On a good day, I can ignore it.  On a bad day, I may not make it out of bed.

On the day after a bad day, I exercise.  As soon as I can gather enough gumption to get up, I figure out when and how I can get sweaty and breathless.  It works like a high-powered vacuum on my head.

I am one of the lucky depressives.  Medication mostly works for me.  I have a list of things to try whenever I start to fall under the sway of the monster, up to and including massive doses of Julie Andrews.  But always, one of the very best choices I can make is to move my body.

If you have a similar problem, I am ready to be here for you, whenever.  Call/text/email/smoke signal/telegraph me in an emergency, or just because.  And please, consider going outside and moving.  It helps.

Musical chairs, or get up and dance

Last week I had to sit for hours, in a car, in a classroom, and in a car again.  It was more exhausting than the longest bike ride ever, with hills.  The next day I was wiped out. 

I am lucky in that I no longer have a sedentary job.  I would not be able to stand it.  In retrospect, even when I had one, I would find reasons to get up and move around—conferring with my coworkers, running work errands, standing to make copies.

We need to make sure we move.  There are many articles out there on ways to do it at work, including standing desks, walking meetings, even hydrating so that bathroom breaks are necessary.  Let’s figure out what we can do to keep out of our chairs as much as possible.  We will feel better!

No, there are not too many patterns; why do you ask?

In general, I prefer to keep things simple.  I do not buy the Best Ever Fitness Gadget of the Month, even if they make a red one.

That said, sometimes I need to get fitness things to make the experience better.  There are two kinds of purchases:  good for the body and good for the psyche.

In the former category, I have bought, at different times, weight lifting gloves, better pedals for my spin bike, and actual workout clothes that don’t end up weighing a thousand pounds and lying there all wet on my back.

That last item also fits into the latter category.  Having workout clothes that fit, feel comfortable, function well, and look cute enough to distract from the sweat factor can make the difference between feeling up to a workout and not so much.  New headphones, new music, a sassy helmet (always wear a helmet when being sassy, just in case!), all good for the soul.

What small thing can make the difference today?  Get it and go play!

Or you could just blow a raspberry...

Why do we want to exercise?  Each of us has a different answer, or complex of answers; knowing why can help us stay focused.

The hard part, sometimes, is being honest about the reasons.  It is totally socially acceptable to say we exercise to be healthy.  Secretly, it may be all about showing that particular person just how awesome we look and neemeeneemeeneemee.  Perhaps we love doing hard things, but don’t love admitting it lest people think we are too weird.  Perhaps we are afraid of having to wear muumuus later in life, even while playing Santa.

Digging into the why helps us choose the kind of reminders we need to get out of bed or off the couch or out of the office to move.  Personally, I need to remind myself how much better I feel after exercising.  I need to remember that I like to defeat those weights.  I need to remember that I like to flex my muscles in the bathroom mirror (embarrassing, yes, but true.).

Knowledge is power (well, actually, power is energy consumed over unit of time, but the point stands.).  Be powerful!

From idea to action

I get all excited reading fitness magazines and books.  I mark exercises to try, workout strategies, yoga routines, recipes, and even pictures I particularly like.  There I am, all inspired! 

Oh, right, you have to DO something to get the benefit.  I knew there was a snag.

Here’s my plan:  sneak a little bit of new into the old.  Maybe I’m not going to do a whole yoga progression, but I can decide that my waiting-around stance is going to be tree this week.  I have to do some kind of weight work, so I can try one new workout.

Steal this plan.  It’ll be fun.  Trust me.