Svelte

It is time. Time to get back into the exercise game.

I would not say that I am a sedentary person, but there was a time in my life when I ran 20-24 miles a week and biked EVERYWHERE and was going to university and had two jobs. I weighed a lot less then. Mostly because I was poor: no money = no car + viewing cheese as a luxury splurge item + hardly ever eating out.

I'm not trying to get back to that mid-20's size - although that would be AMAZING - but enough is enough. Time to get back into an actual regime of raising my heart rate for a sustained period of time. Also, no more buying snickers bars at the kit-kat store that is kitty-corner to my school as a reward for just surviving another day. I'll eat an apple instead. (Yeah, right. It's gonna be


Let's talk for a minute about motivation. In all areas of my life, I have very little success with external motivators. I do things because I want to, or  I don't do them. That is what it always comes down to. Of course, there are shades of grey and sometimes it's less like 'I want to do laundry' and more like 'I know I have to do laundry because everything I own has food spilled on it', but by and large, if I am really not into doing something, it is VERY hard to force myself. I think that's called 'willpower'. I don't have a ton of it.

However, I feel ready. I feel excited. Ok, I bought a new pair of bright pink runners and if any external motivator is going to influence, it's spending money on a new pair of shoes that I have to justify. Plus, they're NEON PINK! FUN! Wouldn't you want to wear these?

So here is the plan, in loose terms:

1. Bike everywhere (I do that already, unless I need to haul stuff around)
2. Eat Healthy (I also usually do this already, except for snickers bars. And ice cream. And blizzards from DQ)
3. Eat Less (THIS IS THE HARDEST ONE! I LOVE FOOD!)
4. No Booze (Hidden calories! Au revoir, Pino Grigio. I will miss you. And also you, beer. Sigh. Till we meet again, Gin and Tonic. Same to you, mojito. And you, margherita. Man, that part might be harder than I thought).
5. Heart Rate Up!: I used to run a lot! 6 days a week! 4-6 miles a time! But then my knees started hating me. So I stopped. Plus, eating is more fun than running. However, I'm going to try running on the balls of my feet - not in those strange finger-toe shoes, but rather in some shoes that have little padding, but still look like shoes. Although at first this kind of thing sounded like pure craziness, the more I've read and researched and thought about it, it makes perfect sense to run striking the ball of your foot first. Let's give it a try, shall we? Gonna start with a walk-run situation and work my way up. 3 or 4 days a week to start.

I'm not really big on weighing myself - I don't find it to be helpful, but I'll keep you posted on how it's going. Ok, let's be honest, I'll keep you posted if it's going well. Otherwise I'll probably just never mention it again.