A Candid Conversation

Can we talk? About Exercise?

It may come as a surprise that I am not one of those people who loves to exercise. When five o’clock rolls around every morning, I have the following conversation with myself:

Me: Julie, ready to run?

Myself: No. It’s too cold.

Me: But you can run inside on the treadmill.

Myself: Well, maybe, if it’s on the treadmill.

Me: You will feel better, energized, and ready for the day, just like you did yesterday after your run.

Myself: Maybe, but I don’t want to run.

Me: That’s ok. How about walking?

Myself: But I don’t want to walk for 30 minutes.

Me: Fine. You can just walk for five minutes.

Myself: Ok I can do five minutes of walking but only walking and just five minutes.

Me:  On your mark, get set, go!

I stepped on my treadmill this morning to walk/run my usual 2+ miles.  With the red magnetic safety button in place, I pressed 3 mph and the green GO square in rapid succession, ready to walk.  Nothing happened.  I pressed everything again, this time slowly and methodically. Still nothing. I checked the power cord. It had a firm connection to the outlet. “Hmmmmm,” I said to myself.

Had my treadmill of 14 years finally given up the ghost? “That would be a bummer,” I thought.

Now I was faced with another decision.  Was I still going to exercise? What was my plan B?

I stared at the control panel remembering when I first got the treadmill. The New Years before I turned forty, I made a goal to run a half marathon and I bought the treadmill as a gift to myself. I was homeschooling three of my four children at the time and my exercise seemed to be a magnet for their mayhem. Every time I even got near the treadmill all hell broke loose.  Eventually I pretended there was an invisible shield around me. Soon my kids learned that unless they were bleeding out, they were not allowed to interrupt me while I was running. I ran every day for one hundred days.  I ran the half marathon I signed up for. Then, like Forrest Gump, I didn’t run any more.

Isn’t it funny (not funny) how hard it is to start a healthy habit and how easy it is to break it?

My treadmill transformed into a kid backpack rack virtually overnight. When my husband noticed it was no longer used for its intended purpose, he dragged it out to the shop with the other exercise equipment I had bought, used, and left for dead. Sort of an exercise equipment graveyard. Sitting in one corner was the Health Rider I got bored with after two pregnancies. Next to it a fancy weight set collected dust. The leg machine I bought to rehab a torn hamstring idled next to the broken, hand-me-down stationary bike my sister-in-law gave me which I never fixed and consequently, never used. Oh, I tried to walk the short distance to the shop to get back into a routine. But the hundred-yard stretch might as well have been a hundred miles some days and if it was raining, forget about it.

Once I had the bright idea to bring an unused elliptical to my office to see if I would be more successful using it there. My plans were foiled when the delivery person (who shall remain nameless) misjudged the height of the parking garage ceiling transforming the metal machine into a mangled mess.

I have tried many things to help make exercise enjoyable: pilates with its promise of toner, leaner muscles, an exercise class at church where I’d meet friends and secretly compete, a gym membership to keep me accountable to the money I was spending. They all helped. For a time. One thing or another got in the way and I got out of exercise.

Then one winter vacation, I started walking on the resort’s fancy treadmill. I walked every day we were there and decided that I may not love walking but it’s what I do best. I am a walker. It’s who I am. I resurrected my old treadmill and made my kids drag it back in the house.

The best time for me to exercise is in the morning. If I don’t get it out of the way first thing, it won’t happen. Sometimes I walk on my lunch hour, but I won’t walk very fast because I don’t want to sweat. And I am not consistent because administrative duties take precedent.  I may not walk on the weekend if outdoor chores prove vigorous enough like push-mowing our acre of lawn or shoveling loads of bark dust or raking leaves. Because I know this about myself, I endeavor to make weekday morning walking a religious routine.

Setting myself up for success is key. I have a pair of well-fitting walking shoes that I only wear inside on the treadmill. I have learned to keep them right by the treadmill so I don’t have to search the house for them and the barrier of “I can’t find my shoes” is removed.

I used to give myself permission to walk on the treadmill in my PJs but found that I never walked fast or long because I never really woke up. I was in my PJs and I associated PJs with sleep and rest, not exercise. So, I found some inexpensive active clothes that I like and removed that barrier.

I listen to music or a book or a sermon or a TED talk so I associate something I like doing with something that I don’t necessarily like doing.

Let me tell you that if at any time during my morning, my well-intentioned husband asks me if I am going to walk that day, the answer is N-O, NO! For the mere reason that he mentioned walking, I will not walk. That’s the Rebel/Questioner in me. I learned this about myself from reading Gretchen Rubin’s book, The Four Tendencies. She sorts out human motivation in four different categories Upholder, Obliger, Questioner, Rebel. I think I could be any one of them, depending on the situation.

The Upholder in me exercises because my patients expect that I exercise, and I have made a commitment to practice what I preach.

The Obliger in me exercises because I want to be around for a long time to play with my grandkids.

The Questioner in me understands all the reasons exercise is good for me; and it’s so much more than just weight regulation.

The Rebel wants to do exercise my way, not the American Heart Association’s prescribed 30min five times a week. I’d rather walk 29 or 31 minutes, not 30 minutes. And I’ll walk when I say, not when my husband suggests.

Before going to my plan B, (my kettle bell routine) I checked one more thing on the treadmill. Turns out  it wasn’t broken. The connection was faulty on the receiving end. A little cord wiggling and it was good as new. The bells and whistles indicated my session started and I finished my five minutes.

That wasn’t so bad. I think I’ll do another five.

What do you like to do that you are willing to do and why? If you are not sure, give us a call at Oregon Weight and Wellness where the exercise conversation will be way different.

PS To find out your tendency, you can take the Four Tendencies Quiz here.