Thursday, May 24, 2012

What's Stopping You?

Let's say you're not like me. You don't enjoy exercise and don't find time for it because it's not something you want to do. Well, welcome to the world of the average person. I really like getting fit, and then using my fitness for fun, work and competing. You may just want to look a little nicer, be healthier, or some other goal.

You could claim to be non-athletic, thus you shouldn't even try to get fit. Well... guess what, my genetics aren't that great: I have the build of Clarke (my Dad's side of the family), and no offense to them, but they aren't that fit. Granted, I'm only 16, so I have the upper hand of being young... but I'm also one of the most fit guys on teams, so I'm pretty fit for my age group as well. How did this happen even though my genetics weren't very good? I trained hard and ate pretty healthy (only starting to eat healthy this year).

Ok, so now that you know genetics aren't stopping you (unless you're super fit and you reached maximum muscle capacity, which I'm sure none of you readers ever will, nor will I), what could be stopping you? You might say: "Well duh, I'm too busy." I highly doubt that. If you're reading this, you have time to workout unless you're a speed reader... but what if you have a Facebook? Or a Google+? how much time do you waste on those? I know I waste too much time on them. It's easy and addictive. You may spend some time on there doing something productive, but chances are you are wasting time as well. Facebook and Google+ are great ways to talk to friends you can't see often or plans things, but it really has become a time consumer for me, and probably a time consumer for thousands or millions of other people too. The same goes for things like YouTube, Pininterest, email texting... etc.

Imagine if you cut off 25-75% of your Facebook/Google+/texting/etc time and put it towards exercise. Would you gain fitness? Oh yeah you would! If you spend more than 2 hours on all that stuff a day, you could take off 25%-75% of that and replace it with exercise, you'd be exercising 30-90 minutes a day. That is plenty of time to exercise! You get the most of your workout within the first hour, so you only really need that much time, or less!

What if you go on those things at night when it's too late too exercise? Well, it's not too late to exercise. If it is, you should be going to bed, not texting or Facebooking. This way you will go to sleep earlier, get up earlier and then maybe have time in the mornings to workout.

Ok, if none if the above applies to you, yet you can't get a workout in and your problem is TV or movies. Well, watch less TV and/or movies. A movie usually lasts 1-3 hours. You only need 1/2 a hour to workout. 1 hour is better, but still, 2 hours of sitting on the couch, or 1 hour of exercise? Which sounds healthier?

What if you like video games. Those are real time suckers, and aren't good for you. I like them, but I notice if I play them more I feel tired, lazy and heavy. If you really can't stop playing them, do pushups during load times at least...

Ok, one of the best excuses? Homework. Honestly, that shouldn't be a problem. It's more likely one of the above. Some of the smartest people I know practice their sport 1-3 hours a day! They still manage their homework quite well, and some of them get to bed (or so they claim) before 10 every night. Sorry folks, homework probably isn't it. Maybe in college, but you can usually find 30 minutes a day no matter your homework load.

Here's probably the best excuse: work. I never had a constant job before (plan to soon), but some days when I worked 5-7 hours I still managed to fit in a workout. Some of you work 12 hour workdays. Ok, you got got me beat. It's a real toughy to fit in a workout then... but I doubt you'll be working everyday. If you are, you'll probably burn out soon enough. So workout on your off days... at least 30 minutes! That's barely any time if you clean out some Facebook time. Go Nike style: Just Do It.

Ok, going to point fingers, but I heard this before: "It's bad for my hair to shower everyday, so I can't workout everyday." or "My won't dry in time." Uh. First off, you don't need to workout everyday. 4-6 days is best. Second is, dry your hair, then brush it or something. Thirdly, washing your hair isn't that bad for it. I shower everyday. Sometimes twice a day. Even three times a day if I get super sweaty from three different things throughout the day. My hair doesn't get any worse. My hair is only 1/2 to 5 inches, but still, it can't be bad for it.

If you care more about your hair than your health... well, it's time to rethink things.

What I said about work was wrong: the best all time excuse is: an injury. That's a pretty darn good excuse. If you can't workout without aggravating your injury, then don't. Usually you can. For example: upper body injury: Try running, biking lower body weight lifting and maybe some core. Lower body injure: Do some upper body as long as it doesn't hurt the injury more!

These habits are hard to break. Try and break them. Slowly but surely is good. Don't go full out, burn out and give up. That's useless. Slowly incorporate working out into your life style.

Still reading? You probably could have done over 50-200 pushups within the time you took to read this. Not all in one set, but within a workout. So if reading this is the only thing stopping you from working out, don't read my blog and workout.

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