Just do it.

You don’t need to convince me that fitness is important. I know the value of it—I’ve got a Thighmaster under the bed, a big rubber ball for sit-ups in the closet, and a ton of workout DVDs. Somewhere around here I’ve even got hypnosis CDs to inspire healthy eating and enthusiasm for exercise. It’s the motivation that’s lacking, for when it comes to actually exercising, I am a fortress of fitness resistance.

“Why did you do track, if you weren’t particularly good at it and didn’t particularly enjoy it?” Hannah once asked.

“So I could eat more cookies,” I told her truthfully, and maybe a smidge defensively I added, “It’s a reason. I was very passionate about cookies, okay?”

 

There’s no reason why I should have anything less than a perfect physique. No good reason, anyway. I can think of a plethora of lame reasons. I think of them all the time. You see, I wanted to exercise, but there were all these barriers standing in my way.

It’s too cold. It’s raining.

Looks like it might rain. Looks like it might get cold.

It’s too hot. It might get hot.

Too bright, too dark, too mosquitoey.

Never was it too dangerous. I’ve been fortunate to live in many wonderful, well-lit, well-patrolled towns through the years. Not that it stopped me from worrying about danger, though.

When all the stars aligned and I jogged, I did so at night. Ever-cautious, I never wore headphones and tried to remain alert to my surroundings. Inevitably, at the darkest points in the journey—usually when I was equidistant between two street lamps—a second shadow would creep up behind me. Fight-or-flight adrenaline would course through me as I prepared to whirl and confront (or more likely evade) my attacker.

It took an embarrassing number of times for this to happen before I realized I was casting both shadows.

Eventually  I realized it would probably be better for my heart health if I quit jogging altogether—if I kept spooking at my current rate, I’d give myself a heart-attack before I ever reaped any long-term benefits from this nightly endeavor.

Time passed. The scale’s report increased, the jeans-comfort decreased, and I signed up for a gym membership, effectively eliminating all the aforementioned barriers.

So I had to think of new ones.

It was too early. It was too late.

I was too tired. I was too busy.

It was too crowded. It was too empty.

It was too expensive.

Yes! Especially now that we are a single income family. Yup, too expensive.

I called to cancel our membership because of my highly legitimate excuse reason.

I called late at night so I could leave a message. Assertiveness isn’t really my strong suit.

The owner called me back the following morning.

He was very understanding of my situation.

Phew! I was off the hook.

He realized that $60 per month was a scary sum when experimenting with being a single-income family, because—guess what?—his wife was just starting her journey as a stay-at-home mom, too.

He completely understood, and would terminate our contract (and auto-drafts) right away. Unless…

Unless?

Unless we really wanted to get physically fit, because he sure didn’t want to take away our opportunity for good health.

Oh brother. Here we go.

Sixty dollars is a scary sum.  What about $15 per person, hmm-let’s-see, that’s $30 per month.  The cost of a date-night dinner for a month’s worth of access to all this fitness equipment and these classes...

Crud. This was not how the conversation was supposed to go.

It did seem noble. All of it—his benevolent offer, my decision to sacrifice a date-night dinner…

So, I agreed to continue our membership. I even came up with this stupid plan to do 5K a day during the week for the month of April, just so that I would force myself to test out the gym membership at this new reduced rate. It was the least I could do, seeing as how I value health so much.

And all that rot.

Yesterday marked the seventh day of my dumb idea, and I did not want to go. I tried to psych myself up—Day seven! Wow! By the end of today, that’s 35k so far. (Expressing it in ‘k’ makes it seem like far more has been accomplished than expressing it in miles. Do you know how much 35k is in miles? Twenty-one[ish]. So, ‘k’ it is!)

My excuses were lining up, begging to be acknowledged. I don’t want to waste gas, and it’s too far to walk. Oh, I was stooping low for that one, I know.

I did everything I could to procrastinate. By noon, the house was spotless. I was contemplating taking a shower and getting ready for the day when the scale caught my eye. I’d done 30k so far this month. I wondered if I‘d lost any weight.

Stepping confidently onto the scale, I looked down and saw that I had GAINED four pounds since this ridiculous fitness plan had begun.

BAM! Instant motivation!

I did not shuffle the scale and try again.

I did not undress and try again.

I did not use the restroom and try again.

Motivation had arrived, and I needed to leave for the gym right away!

On the treadmill fifteen minutes later—and not happy about it, either—I realized that thinking of lame reasons is a kind of exercise. A mental exercise. And if that’s true, my brain has a perfect physique.

Until something changes and I fall in love with working out, if I want to get fit, I’m going to have to follow Nike’s advice and just do it.