Just keep showing up
The one thing that I learned in building my habits is that I need to stay consistent especially during the time when I have no fire to do it. For me, habits start to stick when you choose to be consistent despite not feeling the motivation nor the urge.
In the first month of my fitness journey, I was not that great at showing up. But I accepted that as part of my progress. Showing up for 20 days out my planned 25 days of workout is already an achievement for me considering the fact that the month before that I have done 0 workouts.
On January 26, I started to start walking in place for about 30-45 minutes. I decided that for the whole month of February I will do that but try to get an hour of walking in place everyday.
Why did I choose walking in place as my exercise?
First reason is that I have no place where I can walk freely without going out. I did not want to walk with a mask since I feel uncomfortable. So I am only considering indoor exercises.
Since I am doing it in my room right after I wake up, I did not want to walk around my room over and over again because I will get dizzy.
I did not want to follow anymore workout videos since I did not enjoy doing them which in turn makes the fitness journey feels horrible.
I wanted to bring a good balance into my life where I could work on my staying healthy and enjoying the exercises I do.
There is no other physical activity that I liked more than walking. I could walk for hours on end without complaining since I enjoy moving my legs.
So I ended up deciding that for the whole month of February, I will be walking in place for an hour.
The result
You can see that there is a light green on the 26th. That day was when I was truly too lazy to do anything but I did not want to break my streak so I pushed myself to get up and walk. I managed to walk for 25 minutes despite not wanting to do it initially.
This is what I mean when I say that you have to keep showing up. No matter how unmotivated you feel like, just take that one step and it will get easier. I am not going to lie and say that I enjoyed doing this exercise on those days.
However, what I can truthfully say is that thinking about not wantig to break my streak keeps me going. For me, it does not matter if at some days I could not complete the whole 45 minutes, what matters is that I showed up to do it despite not being in the mood.
When you keep showing up
Consistency brings result. A habit will not be formed without consistency. But I also know that I am just a human so there are bound to be days when I am not at my best, and I have learned to live with it.
I have started applying the rule of mean in my life. I learned of this from oyr Ethics class during our Virtue Ethics discussion. Basically it says that to be good is a habit. It means that you choose to be good more often than not which is why it called the rule of mean.
This is what I keep in mind when I feel unmotivated to continue moving. Sure, being lazy for the meantime will satisfy me but getting up and doing exercise will give me longterm benefits.
Closing words
This article has been in my drafts for a few weeks. Today I decided to finish it since I needed the reminder.
I have been feeling unmotivated and down for the past few weeks due to many circumstances. It is hard to feel energetic when I am stretched too thin already and I find myself with nothing to look forward to at the end of the day.
Still, I am doing my best even if my best right now might not seem much. I am trying which is something that I can be proud of. Although, I could feel the inevitable breakdown coming so I am taking things slowly because I know I would have to face my breakdown alone.
Anyway, you might already know that I have incorporated walking outside in my March exercise routine. This is more difficult that just going out of bed and walking in place. I will talk about this once March ends. Can you believe that we only have a few days left this March? Time keeps flying so fast.
You can read my fitness journey last January 2022 here: https://read.cash/@ZehraSky/i-made-up-my-mind-696837e4
Thank you for reading this article!
If you want to read some more articles of mine, I have monthly summaries here:
December 2021 Articles Summary
November 2021 Articles Summary
I have sluggish days, but I do not still on it for too long. I now my limits on being lazy. It is nice to have schedules so that you can track your progress.