Marie WheelerIn October of 2014 I went with my parents to an AMBA (Annual Multiphasic Blood Analysis) Wellness Event to take part in the yearly blood screening. These clinics are held once per year, usually put on by local public health or community service organization and are a fantastic means to obtain a full panel of screening for a supremely reasonable price; I paid around $38, my parents, being a bit older paid a more for some additional testing as it had really paid off in the past: it was how my father found out he had cancer. Needless to say, I highly recommend participating in AMBA if your community hosts the event!
A week or so after the blood test, you and your doctor receive the results. Now don’t think that something so dramatic as happened with my father, happened to me, because it didn’t…I had high cholesterol. I was already on multiple medications for other concerns and really not on board with adding another. Especially not one for what I felt was a lifestyle-related condition.
So, like many, I was at a crossroad. Which path to take?
The paths as I saw them were: do nothing, get medication, or work on diet and exercise. I believe I chose the path of most resistance: I joined the gym and changed my diet.
Now, lots of people join the gym and lots of people fail to attend. I knew from my personal history that joining a gym was always the best route for me as I have a lot of trouble exercising at home and staying on task with distractions. I also knew that if I put down the money, I would attend. I have a good history with that aspect as well. The point: I have spent a lot of time figuring out how I tick and my interventions are based on my knowledge of my self. My interventions are not necessarily your interventions.
So I went to the gym nearly every day from late October through June…and then something happened. Or rather it didn’t. I had been working out regularly, paying attention to keeping rest days as days of just walking or working on mobility and seeing major improvements to my body in terms of musculature and weight management. I felt good. I think the slow decline started with vacation and went forward from there, but instead of getting out of bed every day at 5 to go work out before I head to the office, I hit the snooze button and sleep another hour.
Now, I’m not to a point where I have stopped going to the gym daily. I have still been going every weekend, so the musculature I built and weight management are still intact, but the confidence in my process has waned.
Why was it so easy to break this habit? A habit that makes me feel good and a habit I love?
There was a part of my morning exercise habit that I began to not enjoy and then found excuses to validate the behavior of not going to they gym. What was that part? People. Or rather one person. Who consistently wanted conversation while I was trying to pack in a workout and get to work on time.
I was having to build in an extra 10-20 minutes to talk with this person because he didn’t have constraints on his time and is poor at taking hints. Now, I’m not a horrible person, I am genuinely friendly and truly enjoy talking with people and learning about them, it’s much of what I do for a living. Socialization is fine when I do it on my terms and when I’m open to it. I need down time to be the ideal me.
Habits will break when they aren’t enjoyable or aren’t in line with your personal needs. I needed the quiet of the habits I created. I needed the moving meditation. When that need was left unmet, excuses took a foothold.
So what am I going to do about it? I am going to re-commit to my healthy habit and return to daily gym-ratdom. If my need for solitude is unmet, I will make time for it elsewhere. I will sacrifice politeness and not stop my workout to talk. If the person wants to talk, it will be while I am moving forward in my personal health, because it is my life impacted by my reaction to his behavior. This is the place I choose selfishness. This is the time to assert myself.
Oh yeah, and my cholesterol is ‘awesome’ to quote my doctor.
