Does this sound like you?
You work out as hard as you can five or six days a week, making sure to include all the good stuff—intervals, squats, pull ups, push ups, and other good-for-you whole body exercises.
You make sure and walk or bike when you can, and if you don’t live in a city, you make a special effort to walk your dog or go for a stroll in the outdoors at least a couple of times a week.
Basically, you’re pretty active.
But what do you do on your off days?
1…2…3.
I still remember that day. The day I did my first real push up. Actually, the day I did my first three real push ups, to be exact.
I was visiting my parents, so I must have still been in college. And though I’ve always acted strong and tough… In reality, I had a pretty weak upper body my entire youth.
How weak?
I didn’t get an excellent on my Presidential Physical Fitness Test in grade school because I couldn’t do a single pull up (my good friend and athletic arch rival Renee did two).
I definitely couldn’t do a push up.
And until about three years ago, my brother called me “spaghetti arms.”
Now, to be fair, I have a build somewhat like my Dad’s—we’re both tall and lanky, with long, stringy arms.
We’ve both always had a hard time getting long sleeved shirts that would cover our entire arms. In fact, my arms are so long my high school basketball coach asked me if they ever drug on the floor (I was not amused at the time).
“My toilet seat is so low. I’m thinking about getting an extension. You know, so my knee won’t ache when I’m getting up.”
This is what I hear from the room next to me, as I’m laying face down on a squishy chair in my chiropractor’s office. The voice is husky, man-like, though obviously coming from a woman.
I hear my chiropractor ask the woman if she got new shoes as an electric current goes through my neck and causes a muscle spasm I can’t control.
“Yep,” she says, in an obviously disgruntled voice. “Velcro ones. I can’t bend over, you know, ’cause I’m so heavy. Once I lose a few pounds, I can get ones with laces.”
She then goes on and on to talk about her various health issues. About how she has a new folding cane, one that can fit in her purse so that if she has to go anywhere, she won’t slip and fall. She talks about the toilet seat again, and I hear my chiropractor, a petite woman in her forties, act interested.
God, I think, as another spasm takes hold of my body. Don’t let that be me.
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Like it or not, we were given one body to last us a lifetime. We can take care of this body, nurture it, keep it strong and healthy, or we can let it fall apart, so as the years go by we can do less and less with it.
It may be about looks now, but this body of your will be with you when you have children (if you don’t already). And it’ll still be there with you when you turn into a grandparent.
In fact, long past the time when you give a damn about what the opposite sex thinks of you, your body will still be yours.
“Crack.”
That was the sound of my neck one evening.
Now I’ll be the first one to tell you that cracking bones is no abnormal occurance for me. I’m a regular snap-crackle-and-pop machine (it creeps the hell out of my sister).
But this crack… this one wasn’t normal.
The pain started soon after. I lost the ability to turn my head to the right, and shooting knife-like sensations started firing into the back of my neck any time I tried to move it like a normal human neck is supposed to move.
I tried to sleep, hoping the night’s rest would make the pain go away, but I had no such luck. I called up my chiropractor the next morning and she agreed to meet me within a few hours.
Turns out, the knife-like pain in my neck was nothing serious. The chiropractor gave me a very painful massage and a few adjustments, then sent me on my way, telling me to rest, rest, rest!
But the whole episode got me thinking. This weird can’t-move-my-neck experience has actually happened to me once before. I’ve also knocked a rib out of place a couple of times—an incredibly painful experience.
What did all these painful experiences have in common? I’d been training a lot, doing something heart poundingly hard nearly every single day… but each time, had forgotten to take any time to recover.
In short, I was overtraining.
How do you motivate yourself to exercise when there are dozens of things you’d rather be doing?
You know it’s good for you. Exercise helps you reach and maintain a healthy body weight, lowers blood pressure, gets rid of bad cholesterol, strengthens bones, lowers your risk for cancer, and decreases stress.
But we all know the truth: finding the time and motivation to get off the couch and work out isn’t always easy.
Here are seven ways to get—and keep—the motivation to exercise regularly:
Many gym-goers spend hours on the treadmill even though they hate it (this used to be me).
Yet there are plenty of other forms of exercise that can be just as (or more!) beneficial for weight loss and cardiovascular health.
Try a new class, substitute long cardio sessions with interval training, join a friendly sports team with your buddies—anything that will help you look forward to exercising, rather than dread it.
Using a journal to track measurements like weight and body fat percentage as well as progress made in your workouts will keep you much more motivated than looking in the mirror every day.
Just being able to see in print (or on the screen) that all your hard work has paid off can be the motivator you need to keep you working out on a regular basis.
If you’re like most people, you may be tired and unmotivated before your workout, but feel nothing short of amazing afterwards.
Some people spend every minute of their lives obsessing over food.
Devout Paleo diet followers, for instance, nearly cry if a speck of grain touches their lips. They have a hard time eating out with friends, and can’t enjoy a rich dessert at a party. And this is the same for any extreme dieter, not just Paleo lovers.
If that’s the kind of life you want to live, go for it.
I, on the other hand, am a big believer in enjoying life.
I want to experience everything life has to offer, and yes, that means a glass or two of wine several times a week, some bread here and there, even (gasp!) a melt-in-your-mouth chocolate chip cookie once in a while.
No, I don’t eat these things every day, but I do eat them more often than you might think.
Why? I want to be happy. I want to experience life with the people around me. I don’t want to obsess about every morsel of food I eat—I want to enjoy my food.
I live by the 80/20 rule — 80% of what goes into my body has to be good food (fruits, veggies, protein, healthy fats, etc.)—and 20% can be the fun stuff (wine, treats, carbs).
I was watching old episodes of Ally McBeal the other day while doing some work (don’t ask me why—the selection on Netflix is pitiful these days), and during one early episode, after everything else in her life goes wrong, she repeats, “I have my health. I have my health. I have my health…” over and over.
And it’s true, isn’t it? There are so many things that are important to us… our families, our careers, our hobbies… but without our health, where would we be?
Yet for some reason, in this day and age, people seem to take their health for granted.
There’s so much information out there about how to keep yourself healthy into old age, yet people rarely follow it—thinking instead that they are invincible and that they don’t need to do these things and follow these rules, even though everyone else should.
How many people do you know that value their sleep?
Eat fresh produce on a regular basis?
Make an effort to exercise and be active in their daily lives?
Admit it… it’s depressing.
You work out on a frequent basis. You do resistance exercise and high intensity cardio like you know you should. You try and eat nutritious, healthy foods (and not too much of them) 90% of the time. But the scale refuses to budge.
And you can’t help wondering…
Do you just need to be patient, waiting for the numbers to finally get smaller?
Or could it be possible that the numbers on scale doesn’t really matter… and you’re actually making progress, despite your stagnant weight?
People have been using scales to determine their physical health for ages. Long ago, someone determined that what you weigh is somehow the pinnacle of how fit and healthy you are. And society wholeheartedly accepted this.
Heck, I remember hearing about cheerleading squads in high school who wouldn’t accept anyone into their team who was over 120 pounds, despite their level of skill or overall appearance.
Not even two pounds over. Does that seem right to you?
Well, the ugly truth about the scale is that it doesn’t actually tell you how in shape you are.
Why? Because the scale only looks at your overall weight… it doesn’t consider other (more important) factors such as how much muscle you have, how dense your bones are,
Are you one of the thousands of people who wastes their time in a gym on a regular basis?
I hope not.
But it’s not uncommon. In fact, I’d say it’s the norm, rather than the exception.
Practically every day, I take my dog on a walk down our little neighborhood street in San Francisco. Every time, I pass by a little gym. When I peek inside, it’s full of people on reclining bikes, elipticles and treadmills (I’ve never seen anyone lifting weights, probably because the only weights in there are two to eight pounds).
Every day, I notice something very, very wrong about the picture I see inside that little gym.
Nearly every single one of these people is reading something — a magazine, a tablet, their phone.
Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever tried it, but reading while you do the types of high intensity workouts we do on this site is close to impossible. Whether you’re doing plyometrics, jumping rope, wall balls, or sprinting… you won’t be able to keep your eyes still enough to focus on the words.
If you like to hear stories, recent news or learn something new while you’re working out, listen to a podcast or e-book instead (I often do, though I make sure it’s something I don’t have to pay too close of attention to – This American Life is one of my favs). Don’t read a physical book.
Are you food obsessed?
Don’t feel bad answering yes (most people are, to some degree).
I am, and I’m not afraid to admit it. I think about food constantly. Just ask my husband — I’ll be finishing breakfast, lunch, or a mid-afternoon snack when I’ll suddenly ask him, “so, what should we have for dinner?”
I can attribute this food obsession to three things:
Being hypoglycemic means I need food often.
In fact, if I don’t eat every two to four hours, I get dizzy, light headed, and CRANKY. Anyone who knows me knows that if I say I’m hungry, I need food right now.
Especially as a kid, there weren’t many options available to vegetarians outside of making your own meals.
At restaurants, all I’d often be able to eat was salad and bread. At friends’ houses, the parents would often try to shove meat down my throat, disbelieving that a child could make her own decision about what she puts into her body.
As a result, I developed a slight (or maybe not so slight) anxiety about getting enough substantial food.
