Torture. When it comes to exercise, I am the best at justifying my laziness. I can easily find other, less horrible ways to spend my time, such as cleaning the fridge or gluing my eyeballs to pinterest (where I pin exercise tips, of course). Even if I start out on the elliptical, or free weights, I give up easily due to fatigue, or any other pathetic reason. The best way for me to truly get a work out, is to be forced into it. Don't get me wrong, I don't mean at gun point or on pain of death, but it has to be something that I can't just easily stop half way through. For example, hiking. This one will work after you get me to the hill and or trail. Once you start, you pretty much have to complete it. If you sit down half way, you're stuck there until you get back up. This has been the case for my entire existence. When I was younger, it didn't really matter, since I had time to play and burn calories that way. Now that I am a somewhat full fledged adult however, most of my responsibilities are sedentary. In the last 5 years I have been slowly putting on the pounds. So slowly in fact that I didn't really notice all that much until just this last year. Now that I have fully noticed and am horrified, I am finding it difficult to loose said poundage. I have embarked upon a salad diet, which I am loving. I have figured out a way to have salads more frequently without most of the hassle, which I plan on sharing. Also, did you know that salads don't have to be boring? I have never thought them to be boring, but I know a lot of people think that they are. Salads are one of the most customizable food in existence. But I digress.
Back to the wonderful world of exercise. Salads just aren't making my progress quick enough. There is hope! My mindset has changed, as have my tactics. I have decided that I need to find an activity that is fairly easy to do that both my husband and I can do together. By easy, I mean not complicated. We kayak together but you have to load up the kayaks and drive somewhere and pack a lunch, yatta yatta. Biking. My husband loves biking and has had one for years, but I have not. I have been saving for a mountain bike and plan on making the purchase in the next month or so. I shall keep you posted on that front. Also, I am waddling towards running. I am not there yet, but have researched the safest and most likely to succeed steps towards going from couch potato to runner. I love the idea of running. I am just too out of shape and fat to enjoy it now. I have started walking 3 times a week for this and last week for 20-25 minutes. Next week I will move on to 4 times a week for 25-30. From there I will start including short running jaunts for 30 seconds to 1 minute. We will see how long I stick to this. This method is supposed to start you out slow enough to minimize injury, as well as not burn one out as well. I have been taking my oldest dog, Marshall with me for moral support and theoretical safety. He's large and people usually give us a wide birth, as he looks like he can swallow most attackers whole. Plus, his gate is just about perfect. He walks a little faster than I do, at all times, so I either have to rein him back or walk faster to keep up. Also, he never snickers at my splotchy red face, or wind wrecked hair. All he does is trot next to me with a big ole grin on his face.
As far as goals go, I don't really have a weight number in mind. I just don't want to look quite so chubs in pictures and I want to feel more energetic. That being said, it is fairly difficult to measure success without some sort of number. Once I get further on my path I will track by measurements. It's a little too depressing to do so now. I hope to loose some inches in my upper legs, hips and waist area, while gain a few in my calves and bicep/tricep area. So far, with just the introduction of heaps of salad and my week and a half of walking, I have lost 6 pounds. Yippee! I have a lot more to go, but the improvement is encouraging. I think it would be cool to get to the point where I look forward to exercise, whether it is cycling or running, instead of full on dread.
Wish me luck, and if you see me out there, please don't honk.
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