New gym, new start

I have a love-hate relationship with exercise. Or if I’m going to be honest, most of the time it’s just a hate relationship. I always hated PE (gym) classes in school and I’m way too uncoordinated to play a sport in order to make exercise more fun. Nevertheless, I am once again hoping that a fresh start at a new gym will get me back on the path to fitness and rid me of my winter chub.

I’m lucky enough to be one of those people who don’t stack on a lot of weight if I don’t exercise, but this is also a curse. It means that I can go to the gym for six months, tone up, feel great and then slack off for a further six months before I really start noticing that my clothes don’t fit too well.  But the older I get, the more I notice that my body doesn’t like being unfit, regardless of what size or weight I am. Lately I’ve noticed my joints feeling stiff and my muscles seem to pull much more easily. This shouldn’t be happening at my age (31) and wouldn’t be a problem if I spent less time sitting on my butt.

The biggest problem I have (aside from general motivation) is that I find it really hard to convince myself that exercise is something you have to do regularly, properly and forever. You can’t just stock up (like I’ve been doing) and then take a rest for a year.

There have been times when I’ve managed to keep up a gym routine for over twelve months, have gotten really fit and have then enjoyed exercise. There was even a time when I felt itchy and restless if I didn’t exercise. But whenever I hit a snag, even if it’s a legitimate reason to not exercise for a while (eg illness), I find it next to impossible to start up again. I like couch surfing, and I’m a homebody at heart, and I exercise because I have to, not because I enjoy it.

So this time I’m not going to make a big song and dance out of starting at my new gym. I’m just going to try to think of it as something I do as part of my work day (I joined one that is between my office and home) two or three times a week. I know if I can go for about six weeks in a row (which is usually about how long it takes before I can see a difference) I will have broken the habit barrier and might actually stop hating it so much. Wish me luck!