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Dear WW Philadelphia Member,
Oh, the pains of adding activity to my life!
Yes, I know it’s good for me; yes, I’ve worked it into my life as a routine many times. Have I ever built it as a real habit? Probably not. I think of habits as things I finally learn to do naturally. Adding activity to my life is always the “extra” effort for me.
When I joined Weight Watchers (33 years ago this month), I promised myself I’d learn to exercise. Mainly because I was losing a lot of weight–90+ pounds at the time, and the scale was moving down. I was excited about how my body would look from that big of a loss, but I also knew I needed to get moving.
I wanted a stationary bike! One with the arm pedals in addition to the foot pedals. I told myself I’d ride it one hour a day. I got the bike and the first time I rode it, I lasted 10 minutes and then recuperated on the couch for the next 30. I’m not kidding! Gradually, I added minutes and over a period, I was riding the bike for one hour a day.
Next activity step was aerobic classes. Here’s where the help of “community” came in for me–but not in the way you might think. At that time, the way the community in that class worked for me was I wasn’t going to let that room of strangers see me quit before the class was complete!
Over the years, I have met friends or family at the gym or walked or hiked with them and that’s always a fun way to get activity in. Darling husband and I took a great walk recently with some hills and lots of things to look at and talk about as we walked. Plus, it was a little chilly and that encouraged me to walk a little faster to warm up and stay warm.
Finding a way to add activity that works for us is important. It might be little things that force us to take extra steps like parking further from the door of the store. I always walk to the printer that’s the furthest away from my office instead of using one in my office. Little things like that count. Every effort counts.
Try a class at the gym or from the app or the internet, with a partner or alone. Sometimes the friend is more of an accountability partner and you check in with each other about your activity goals instead of doing them together.
Walk the dog, play with the kids, gardening and yard work, every movement counts, and it is all good.
Have A Great Week
DebW
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