Life, The Universe and Everything

Today marks the 42nd straight day of me dragging my increasingly-less-penguin-shaped behind onto the treadmill. That's 6 solid weeks of me spending at least 20 minutes walking toward a green wall and, even after somewhere around 70 miles, never quite getting there.

My strategy for sticking with this is simple. I set my workout clothes (never underestimate the importance of this as a piece of exercise equipment)(unless you are a guy) out where I can just roll into them before grabbing my morning coffee. With sneakers laced up, I suck down the coffee and a cup of milk while checking the morning email, then head down the hall to the treadmill. I made a deal with myself that, for the first three weeks, all I had to do was power up the treadmill, poke the button for the easiest pre-set program (1 mile, 20 minutes) then not fall off the back. Show up, one button, and avoid landing on my face--it was that simple, and I usually started before I was alert enough to talk myself out of it. Even before the first three weeks were up, I had ventured off the pre-set and started to do longer and harder sessions. My deal with myself has graduated to doing at least 20 minutes at at least 3.5 mph. Most days, I do more, but it's nice, psychologically, to know that all I have to do is that, and I can do more as I feel like it. Usually, I do. Even today, sore from digging up parts of the yard yesterday, I did 30 minutes between 3.5 and 3.7 mph. That's not much for you performance athletes out there, but it's a big increase over my former "no exercise."