Working on My Fitness

The one item on my list of New Year's Intentions that I feel like I am giving the least attention to is my physical well-being. In general, I kindof look at my health as something of a challenge: it's as if I am trying to see how little attention I can give my body while still being relatively healthy and staying alive.

I tend to go through my life ignoring most of my health issues. Here's an example of my inner dialogue:



"Ouch! what was that start pain in my chest??"
"I dunno, but it really hurt!"
"Eh, it's probably nothing. I don't even feel it anymore. Let's get pizza!"
"oooh, pizza! And then let's get a bacon cheeseburger to wash it down with."
"Definitely. And maybe wash that down with a half of a bottle of wine"
"*inner smile* You get me. Should we walk the three blocks to the pizza place?"
"Why walk, when the bus is coming in 10 minutes."
"You're so smart. But let's sit down to wait, my legs are starting to tingle."

End scene.

When I do get into these periods of exercise and eating better, they usually last for about 2 weeks, and then it's back to eating an entire package of turkey bacon or eating 2 slices of cheesecake before bed. The thing is that, although I tend to stay relatively skinny (or as I like to refer to it: skinnyfat, where you are thin, but kinda droopy due to a lack of muscle and tone), I don't sleep enough so I am exhausted a lot, and my overall health isn't that great. It's more than just weight and looking good, it's about strengthening your bones and keeping your body healthy on the inside so that you can stay healthy as you age.

One of my friends got me into going to Zumba last year, and I was actually really enjoying it. I have found that I do best when it is an activity: something fun, and preferably with other people, not just purely exercise. Much like the mother who tricks their child into eating vegetables by covering it with cheese, or pretending the spoon in a rocketship, or, even worse, like the pet owner who has to put the medicine in their pet's food, I usually have to trick myself into wanting to exercise. Now once I get into it, I tend to enjoy it, at least for a little while. The endorphins start flowing, and I might even start to notice that I don't get as tired doing the activities as I did before. However, if I miss a day, it soon turns into a week, which turns into months, until the next time I am presented with the opportunity to go to an event or location where my physique will be on display, or I get a tummy ache from eating an entire "Family Sized" bag of Skittles in one sitting. While I don't think that everyone has to look like an Adonis (I personally like my men with a little meat on them.... and people that are too skinny freak me out), I do think that you should like the way you look, and generally feel good in terms of your overall health.

So, whatever it takes, I am determined to get on a path of better physical well-being. And even though I am trying to not focus on dating or romance right now, this is something that I should be fully dedicated to doing just for me, so that I like the way that I look. Yet and still, when I do start to date, having confidence in the way that I look won’t hurt either.

Last week I did at least go in for a physical (which I had not done in the previous 2 YEARS I realized), so at least I have gotten off to some kind of a start. So now I gotta figure out what to do next. I need to start finding activities that I can do on the regular basis that I will actually want to keep doing. Perhaps more bicycling when the weather gets nice again, or some local indoor activities at a community center, or even back to Zumba. Any suggestions are always appreciated (though not guaranteed to be implemented....).


The scene in the film A Christmas Story where the mother, after countless efforts to get her son to eat his dinner, finally figures out the way to get him to eat. Pretty similar to the bait and switch that I pull with my own desires to exercise. However I don't think pretending to be a pig will help much in my situation....

(photo above: a picture of me, back in 2010, trying to look sexy all sweated out after a workout. Yeah....lol. I think that this was when I was doing this 100 pushups, 200 situps, 200 squats challenge. I never made it to the 100 pushups or 200 situps, but I did make it to the 200 squats, so I felt like hot shit. And then I quit. Haha, classic....)