Unconventional

I was ready to get on the treadmill this evening.  My legs had a strange ache to them like they wanted to walk.  Then I got in the car to head home.  Long car ride southern heat = me falling asleep in the car.

When I got home, I forced myself to wake up because I still wanted to get my workout done.  I sat down to put my sneakers on and I stayed glued to that chair for an hour.  I didn't want to get up!  Changing out of my clothes and finding my one pair of shorts sounded like it would take more energy than I had.  So what did I do? 

I did 20 minutes on the treadmill in my work clothes.  Luckily I was wearing a loose sundress with a short, lacy sweater on top.  I ditched the sweater and started walking.  You guys may think I'm crazy, but the dress already need to go in the washing machine and it was just as comfortable as my shorts would have been -- probably more, since my shorts did into my stomach a bit.

Since I don't want to spend two hours a day exercising, I am modifying a tip from the "Body for Life" book.  I will continue to walk for 20-30 minutes each day, but increase my speed on the days when I want a harder workout.  Today was not that day, though.  I had to pull out all my tricks to stay on the treadmill for 20 minutes.  I focused on my music for a few minutes, then I focused on how many steps I logged on the 10,000 steps counter built into the treadmill.  Next I moved my attention to the pace counter, which shows how long it would take me to walk a mile if I did the whole walk at my current speed setting.  I got a little interval training by changing my speed and watching how it affected the pace counter.  When I was almost ready to give up, I told myself that I could get off when I reached 20 minutes or one mile -- whichever came first.  The 20-minute mark came first, but I was so close to a mile that I walked at cool-down speed until I reached it.

Isn't it crazy the things we tell ourselves to keep going?  The conventional stuff in the books (be good to yourself, do it for your children) doesn't work for me.  Today it was my slightly OCD need to have things line up that got me to the finish line.