I had my last session with my personal trainer on Saturday, and since then have been mulling over my ability to motivate myself. More specifically, why I’m motivated in some areas and not in others.
I have no answers.
Since I bit the bullet and signed up with a trainer, 15 months ago (yikes!), I’ve been pretty discliplined, fitness-wise. I would say I average a visit to the gym four times per week. Sometimes I make six. Sometimes I make six and manage to squeeze in a yoga class, too.
Every now and then, though, I’ll feel unmotivated. I might miss a day. But that’s okay, I’d think, because I’ve got a session coming up on Tuesday, or I’m meeting a friend for a run on Wednesday. I’ll keep going.
Now, it’s kind of scary to think that my $50 an hour safety net is gone. It’s all up to me to finish the hard work-outs, to keep myself going even when all I really want to do is lie down. Am I really going to do burpees if no one is making me? What about Turkish get-ups? I’ve never seen anyone do Turkish get-ups without a trainer standing over them, so will I?
Maybe the fear will keep me motivated enough. I have a binder full of kick-ass total-body conditioning workouts. I have weights and reps written in little blue numbers beside them. I can walk up to any one of the Wal-Mart-blue vested trainers at my gym and ask them a question. I know this. The question is, will I?
Before I started all this, I used to buy those women’s fitness magazines, like Shape and Self, and read the “Fitness Success Stories”. I’d always marvel at women who started out unable to climb a flight of stairs, and went on to take Outward Bound trips to Belize or kayak up the West Coast. I know that fitness will be a part of your life if you make it that way – what I hadn’t counted on was the effort it took to keep that mindset.
I started out wanting to be able to put on a bikini. Well, I’m not quite there yet, I still have a little pudge around the middle, but I think I’ve done pretty well overall. The muffin-tops are long gone. I can see my biceps AND my triceps. I run 5K three tmes a week. I am thisclose to my lifelong goal of being able to do chaturanga dandasana without hitting the floor.
So maybe that’s where the motivation comes from. Right now, I’d be so upset if I lost the ability to do those things. I can’t say going to the gym is my favorite thing in the world, but I guess all the things it gives me are. I can shovel the walk without getting tired. I can hold up a sheet of drywall (barely) if I have to. I know what it’s like to slide down the slippery slope, to feel crappy about how I look and wish my pants fit differently.
I just hope all that is enough.