I used to have a patchy exercise routine.Too often, I will be a regular in the morning exercise continuously over a week. And then what follows will be a lull of week or two.And then it starts all over. As is the case always, I
went into analysis of why this issue is recurrent.
The
primary reason, of course, I was never a fitness zealot. I would have never
passed out of school if Physical exercise wa a mandatory course. But I guess,
at least 90% of us would fall in that category of not being passionate about
Physical routine. The second but a more important reason was the Day itself. What
I mean by that is, whether I would go for an exercise for the day depended on
what laid ahead during the day. So, If the day was light, in terms of
professional or personal commitments,like a weekend, I would invariably opt for the Physical
exercise. If the day was heavy(in my perception), I would often blame on the
climate outside or the lack of time and would skip the exercise routine. This reason as I found out to me was the killer of my exercise routine. I did not have an
answer to this for a long time.
And
then I read the article by Steven Covey on “Important vs Urgent” matrix (http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newHTE_91.htm)
. The basis of this concept is,when it comes to tasks,we need to choose the Important over the Urgent. I applied
this specific concept as a motivation tool for my daily exercise routine. So
when I wake up and kind of faced with a heavy day ahead, I just pose this
question to myself…”Do the issue(s) of the day ahead would really matter to me when I look back in
say 5 years?” (Urgent…but not Important)…Mostly not…On the other hand, the jogging routine today or the lack of it would definitely impact my health outlook in 5
years (may be Not Urgent today,but definitely Important on the long term).
So, these
days, I don’t blame the climate outside or the lack of time. I just go out and
start running .So, even if it is as short as 5 minutes, the racing heart pulse
and the emotional feel of the artery cleansing carries my day. And when I skip the
exercise routine, the lack of the exercise makes me feel so bad that I am up
and running the next day!!!
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