Over the past thirty some odd years I have joined a number of gyms with the intent of getting healthy and staying fit. The results have become so predictable, it’s kind of funny that I would expect things to be different each time.
It goes something like this:
- Find a hip and popular gym.
- Hear the sales pitch, all the while thinking, can we just get on with it.
- Sign a bunch of paperwork, blah, blah, blah.
- Pay all sorts of make-believe fees.
- Buy some fancy schmancy workout clothes.
- Show up back at the gym on the same day, ready to conquer the world.
- Try out every piece of equipment, racket ball court, pool, and steam room.
- Shower and pack up stinky clothes.
- Drive home feeling like the Six Million Dollar Man.
- Pass out by 8:30 due to total exhaustion.
- Wake up next morning barely able to walk
- Go to the gym a half dozen more times over the year, mostly out of guilt for the $40 per month automatically withdrawn from my bank account.
- Try everything to cancel this ridiculous gym membership.
- Swear I will never do that again.
- Do it all over again a few years later.
What is it that always draws me back to repeat this same cycle of events? Well if I am like you it’s the reality that I need to be doing something to keep my body healthy. I see all those fit people on early morning TV working out and getting fit and so I conclude this must be the way it’s done.
Well, friends, I have something to share with you that only took thirty years to figure out, “do the thing you love”. I’ll say it again, “Do that thing you love to do”. I have been running for just about three years now and that’s a lot longer than any gym membership I ever kept. I’ve started to realize that while we all know we need to exercise, stay fit and be healthy, we often try to fulfill that reality in a way not natural to the way we’re wired. Obviously, some folks love to go to the gym and have been doing so since Jack LaLanne was wearing a onesie but for many of us, the gym feels boring and repetitive. I’ve discovered that my active life needs to have a variety to keep it exciting and interesting.
So what do you love to do? Maybe like me, you get bored running the same routes all the time and like some change of scenery? Maybe you enjoy a little rain now and then to mix things up and keep it interesting. Look back in your life to the things you enjoy the most and see how those can be incorporated into your running life. Maybe you like to get on the trail or take photographs of nature, could those things become a unique part of your running adventure? Break the stereotype rules of what you perceive running to be and make it unique to the way you’re wired. You might be surprised to find a whole group of folks just waiting to do something a little different than the norm.
See you soon on the road to adventure,
Greg Paskal
Lead Adventurer