This Live Well post is the first guest post by my very dear and extraordinarily talented friend Lindsay Goodridge:
These are some things I know to be true:
Getting back into exercise is hard!
Maintaining an active lifestyle that is balanced and not made of rules is hard!
Exercising when things hurt or when you’re recovering from an injury is hard!
Choosing to get off the couch… is hard!!
So why would you do it?
That’s the question I ask myself when I’m sitting on the couch – comfy, cozy, having an intimate cryfest with McDreamy. Why would I want to get myself off the couch and into my gym clothes and down the hall to the gym? (Yes. Down the hall… I don’t even get the luxury of the “it’s raining” excuse.)
Before I answer that, I should give you a little background. I have a degree in Human Kinetics, I used to be a personal trainer, and I had a brief stint as a PE teacher. Presently, I am 3 months into my recovery from a knee ACL replacement making me a regular at the physiotherapist’s office. I’m also motivating my recovery by training for a ½ Ironman happening in June and, perhaps most importantly, I love helping others find way to be active! Before you stop listening to me, you need to know that I also used to be an awkward, super tall, lazy kid with a huge blond afro who likely never would have done anything requiring sweating if my best friend hadn’t signed me up for basketball in grade 2. That lazy kid still lives in my brain and shows up daily to try and bribe me out of workouts with extra cheesy nachos or fries with mayo! Mmmmm…
As a trainer, and in my general life, people ask for advice or help being more active. After years of trying to sign them up, give them programs, make them follow rules, have them check in… I simply ask them one question now. “Why would you want to?” The answer is usually because my legs wobble, or I feel fat, or I should be more healthy. But that’s not really answering the question. Forget “shoulding” on yourself, why do YOU want to exercise?
I ask myself as I sit here on the couch… “Why would I want to get off the couch and exercise?” The answer for me is because I feel better when I exercise, my mood is better, my digestive system works better, I’m closer to that weight that makes my clothes feel good and it makes me feel more confident. I also want to be the person that does their physiotherapy exercises and follows through with a commitment that I made to myself. And when I put it that way… how can I not get off the couch?
So… why do you want to exercise?
Next from Lindsay: Starting a running program
You can find other posts in the Live Well series here.
All text and photos © The Muffin Myth 2012
Great words. I have the same approach with nutrition. Instead of launching immediately into a ‘you need to do this, that and the other’ spiel, I spend time finding their motivation and going from there. We are all different and have different motivations and life stories which affect health and attitudes to health and well-being. With my cancer patients and post-treatment cancer folk (who I mainly work with) the answer is often eating for energy and to hopefully reduce the risk of recurrence, and of course different foods ‘work’ for different people, just like different exercise will speak to people differently. Love the idea of this series, Katie. And I look forward to being inspired by Lindsay’s running programme pointers. This almost 49 year old with chronic Achilles’ tendonitis needs help in that department!
Thanks!
I suffered from acute tendonitis and it’s terribly annoying trying to get back into a running or exercise program. I found the best thing was a routine yoga practice. Keeping the calf muscles and feet muscles nice and loose is the only way that you can get some pain-free mobility through there.
Also – just something to consider – I had the plastic removed from the back of my running shoe and it basically removed any achilles issue I was having. Sometime you have a bit of a bone spur on the back of your foot, and that’s where the tendon attaches. If you rub it with something immoveable (plastic in running shoes for example) then it can aggravate it more. If that’s something you’re interested in, I can try and help you figure out where you could get it done!
Lovely post Lindz. Getting back into exercise is really hard – I find my mind saying “You used to swim 3km easy, you ran 10m for fun, you biked across Canada” but my body is no where near that level of fitness and it makes any effort pale in comparison. Thanks for the reminder that I need to remind myself why I want to active – I feel so much better when I am! (And being a good role model is definitely on the list!)
You know, I wasn’t born doing the things that I do
It’s just a matter of making those decisions for yourself… and deciding why you would want to!
I remember days when running for 1 minute 5 times was a huge challenge. But I (and you) took the fist step at one point. Priorities change, and fitting in exercise like that is hard, but lifestyle fitness is something I know that you know a lot about, Jess
talk about luxury – walking down the hall to a gym – i’m green w/ envy. what i wouldn’t give for that and the option of not having to go out in a blizard or lot’s of rain. that would be so nice ….
but your question – i exercise for all the same basic reasons you do. it basically just helps my whole being function more smoothly.
Exactly! Sometimes that first step off the couch is hard – even if your gym is down the hallway! But it’s always worth it to have gone… even if it’s just to have the easiest workout ever. You never regret going.
Couldn’t agree more!
Excellent first post, Lindsay! I agree with Kelli’s comments on the similarities between being motivated to make changes for a healthier diet and changes to include more exercise in your life. I feel so much better when I move my body!
Thanks! I agree with you both and think that the two are interchangeable! You can exercise and eat badly … you can eat well and not exercise… but when you decide to eat well AND exercise, your body and mind feel so amazing!