getting serious about exercise

I have been rather inconsistent about getting my exercise of late. Since my primary form of exercise is walking outdoors, that inconsistency is due to a combination of the weather (love the recent rains, though!) and my own laziness. But then I had a revelation shortly after the first of the year. It hit me that I am having a milestone birthday this year. One of those with a big zero in it. It reinforced for me that my doctor was right in emphasizing exercise when I saw him in November.

Fortunately I have a new app to help me with that. I had long used a walking tracker on my iPhone that worked all right, but with which I was not terribly happy. I got tired of the prompt to upgrade to the paid version every single time I started the app. This was particularly annoying because the developer updated it only rarely. Then there was the fact that the corresponding web site was on United Kingdom time, which meant if I wanted to look at a walk I did today, but if it was after 4:00 p.m. I had to go back a day. The last straw was when I went to save a walk on my iPhone and it zeroed out the whole walk.

So I did some searching. I found an app called Map My Walk. It has a nice clean user interface on my iPhone and it plays nicely with my podcast and Audible audiobook apps, something the previous app did not do. The web site is also much cleaner and easier to use than the previous one.

I certainly feel better when I exercise, and keeping in mind that milestone birthday I am motivated to do so.

trying to get back into the routine

For the past several months I had not been very good about exercising. The heat we had in mid and late summer gave me an excuse to avoid going out walking. But it was just that: an excuse. For a short while I went to the gym here at Four Seasons and did a circuit on the weight machines (as I had done before my surgery), but that did not last very long. There was no good reason for my lapse; I was simply being lazy. I continued to do yard work every Tuesday, but that was the extent of my exercise.

Last week I decided to snap myself out of it. The weather had cooled down sufficiently for me to start walking again, and I did so. I got in three walks last week. I walked Monday of this week and did yard work as usual yesterday. I feel better so I trust that will be incentive for my keeping up the momentum. The Map My Tracks iPhone app, pictured here, gives me good feedback on my efforts.

I’m going to have to be flexible about my routine and not commit to certain days of the week for my walks, or so it appears. We had a couple of days of rain last week, we have more rain coming in today and tomorrow for Thanksgiving, and it looks like there’s another chance of rain for early next week. With any luck the storm door will be open this winter and we’ll get regular precipitation. I certainly hope so, and if that’s the case I’m perfectly happy to mix up my walking days. And even go back to the gym if we get an extended storm.

Regular rain and consistent exercise. That would make for a good winter.

a different kind of exercise

I have long gotten my exercise by walking. I have always had an audio program to listen to while doing so. First it was audio books and then lectures from The Great Courses. Things have changed, however.

I require surgery to remove something on my intestinal tract that does not belong there. My surgeon tells me that the stronger I am at the time of surgery the quicker the recovery. And the kind of strength he wants comes from weight training, not walking aerobic exercise.

Fortunately, my wife Terry knows her way around the weight room and gave me some solid training in the exercise room here at Four Seasons. So it’s a different routine. It’s not conducive to listening to audio programs as I need to focus on what I’m doing. But the work needs to be done, so I’m doing the work.

I want to be as strong and healthy as possible for my surgery.

motivation

I suppose that there are some highly motivated people who find their motivation from within. For most of us, though, certainly for me, external motivation helps move us forward. I have an app on my iPhone called Map My Tracks that records data about my walks. It syncs to a web site. Before the web site was updated (and made less user-friendly in my opinion) I would get a weekly email that summarized my work and gave me a ranking. After the update the emails stopped coming.

I have to say that the emails helped keep me on track. This time of year with colder weather and rain (we appreciate the rain!) it’s harder to stay consistent with my exercise, but I just need to reach for the internal motivation since that one external prompt is no longer there.

new routine

My weekday routine since we’ve been here has been to get up at 7:00 am to feed Tasha and then go back to bed for another half hour or 45 minutes. But I realized that in doing so I was probably getting more sleep than I needed and that I could be more productive. So after Labor Day I started something new. Instead of going back to bed I have started staying up and doing my walking.

This is good because I am getting my walking in on a much more regular basis. I can’t use the excuse that I used in the afternoons that it was too hot to go out walking. I’m feeling better and am in fact feeling more productive. Plus, I don’t feel like I have something hanging over my head all day.

It’s all good.

working on the discipline

I’ve been really good the last several years when it comes to doing my walking on a regular basis. I have long kept a spreadsheet, which helps to keep me honest. That discipline flagged somewhat over the holidays and into the new year. We had our short encounter with the rain and a number of cold days. That gave me an excuse to get sloppy. If the temperature got below 60° I decided it was too cold to go out. (Don’t ask why I didn’t elect to use the treadmill in the gym at the lodge.)

Then I noticed something. People in the Four Seasons community were out walking when it was much cooler than sixty. I saw men and women much older than me out there when the temperature was in the low fifties. That got me back on track.

So much for excuses.