Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Workout Wednesdays: Mama Fit: No more excuses...

Let's try a new series, shall we?  No promises.  But I'd like to try out a weekly post on fitness.  How many of you just stopped reading right there?

OK, so for those of you that are left, let's start with the factor that was holding me back for so long.  The excuses.  I'm being brutally honest here, because this was the major factor in why I didn't get super serious about my fitness goals a long time ago, and maybe why you haven't either...  I made excuses.  Finding time to do ANYTHING for myself is nearly impossible... Nearly, but not completely.  I have found lately, that cutting the crap, and not giving any excuses for why can't work out has freed up a ton of opportunities for me to add some extra fitness into my schedule.  For instance, I no longer accept the following excuses as valid for not working out:
~I just ate
~I haven't eaten yet
~I just showered
~I just drank coffee and my heart may explode
~My sports bra is in the laundry
~The baby is sure to wake up before I finish my workout
~It's too cold out
~It's too wet out
~It's too hot out
~It's too dry out
~The ipod isn't charged

Here's the deal.  That's all bullshit.  For the last few weeks I've been trying something different.  Every morning when The Baby goes down for his morning nap I work out.  First.  before I sit down at the computer.  Before I do dishes (OK, who are we kidding here?  I do everything before the dishes).  And so far, only once has The Baby woken up from nap before I had time to finish the whole workout.  But I got all but the last 4 minutes of it done, and that's 36 minutes longer than I would have if I didn't try at all.

Love this photo from FitPregnancy.

I had 6 different workout DVD's sitting in my tv cabinet collecting dust.  Not to mention the plethora of material available online via YouTube, Pinterest, and various fitness magazines' websites.  So all of my workouts could be done indoors, within ear-shot of The baby's room.  No more excuses about weather.  And as far as all of the other excuses about why it would be uncomfortable to workout on a full or empty stomach, my sports bra being in the laundry, or if the timing was off, and I was going to have to take another shower...blah, blah, blah.  When is it EVER comfortable to do push-ups?  I can do a low-impact workout, like Yoga, and not have to worry if my body-armor-like bra is nowhere to be found.  And, please don't hate me for sounding wasteful here, but I don't feel like it's a "waste" of water to, occasionally, add a 2nd shower to my day.  I'm a Mom.  Therefore, I am sometimes yucky, and go more than a day without a shower (more times than I care to admit).  So I feel like if I get to take 2 in one day, it's just making up for the times I didn't get one at all the day before.  

This is the way it's been going for a little while now, and so far, I don't miss the time that I'm "giving up" to be working out.  I feel better than I did when I was only doing it maybe once a week, and my stress level has gone down considerably.  So there's my first "Workout Wednesday" advice:  Stop the excuses, find time, feel better.


Thanks for stopping by,
-Lindsey     

2 comments:

  1. hahaha those excuses ring so true! Sometimes mine is, "if I go for a walk with nancy and wes around the neighborhood then I cant also go for a run too" oh silly me. I like your commitment to the mornings. :)

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    1. It helps get it out of the way, and also makes me happier for the rest of the day. Remember Legally Blonde? "exercise releases endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people don't shoot their husbands. They just don't." hahaha.

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