In Fitness, Showing Up Is The Battle

Have you ever had a job that you didn't really like, but you thought you had to do it for the money, so you just showed up? 

Then, later, even though you didn't have a passion for the activity, did you notice that you actually became really good at it? You didn't care about it, you just did it, and became an expert at it. How did that happen?

With some things, just showing up is the battle. I hope that you love your job more than the hypothetical person (me and everyone else) that I described. For those of you who don't like working out, but realize that, for health reasons, you still have to, the fact that just showing up is enough is the great news.

You may not love the workout, but if you can get yourself in the door, to your class, or trainer, or scheduled workout, and you do things that have been suggested by someone who knows what they are doing, congratulations. You have succeeded for the day.

At least, this is the case when we put ourselves in the hands of professionals.

"But I can't afford a trainer/gym membership/classes/(insert thing you think you can't afford here)!" Sounds like something I read in a book I've been thinking about writing. It's called "Excuses, Excuses" and it has the potential to be long. There is virtually no end to the number of excuses I will be able to come up with if I am willing to let myself play the game with anything other than 100% responsibility for my actions. It's my job to show up. No one else's.

Can't afford it? Trade for it. Barter. Or, go the internet, find a workout, form a team with other people who can't afford it and go to the Poudre River and use rocks for weights.

If the reason why you are doing this is big enough, you'll figure out how to get it done.

Even as a person who it into fitness, enjoys working out, plays sports in my spare time, I still rely on professional trainers, teachers and coaches to design my workouts.

I went through phys. ed in the late 80's and early 90's. When I wanted to put on weight (I was VERY skinny as a kid), my teacher and football coach told me to eat a lot of eggs and potatoes. The workout he told me to do was all muscle isolation; bench presses, curls, presses, etc. No one really looked at the human body as a cohesive unit. We did three sets of eight to twelve reps with increasing weight. For everything.

Today, working out couldn't be much more different from that. The weights are still there, but there are so many workouts that you can do where you won't even touch a weight. Sometimes, when my trainer has me start an exercise, I'll think "That's all? I can do this all day." Then they add another exercise or four to the circuit and I can feel how the perceived ease of each individual workout combines to create a difficult whole. Like, I'm becoming tired, but I barely notice.

Taking classes, hiring trainers, having a workout partner or team are all things that reduce the task at hand to simply showing up. Are you there? Are you willing? Then you are good.