Back To School Time Means Back To Me Time
Ok, so I’ve been quiet lately. I was out of the country, visiting family, rushing through back-to-school shopping, keeping exceptionally busy with my work – and yes, still working out.
In fact, I’ve managed to run another 5K in the meantime of the madness. I placed 5th in my age group, which I was pretty happy about. My goal is to place within the top 1/4 of any given “race”. (I still don’t like that word. I read somewhere that it isn’t a “race” until you’re getting paid for it. That kind of mindset helps me with my nerves before any “event”.)
Busy days that make up busy weeks that equal a busy summer make it harder and harder to keep up with my workouts. I just continue to motivate myself by reminding my brain that the time that I spend working out is really the only “me” time that I will get within a 24-hour period, so it’s very important to keep it up.
Today was a good day. I ran 5 miles. I walked 1 mile on a strong incline. I did Fitter U Fitness Fat Blaster 1 (love that one) and Insanity Cardio Power & Resistance. So, it was a pretty sweat-inducing day.
The countdown to autumn is on. School starts next week. My workload will only be increasing as we move into fourth quarter. But with the autumn comes great running “events”, cooler temperatures (hopefully), and that renewed routine that I absolutely love! It’s a chance to settle into something challenging and something rewarding. It’s that same back to school feeling that I always get at this time of year. Now, I apply that same feeling to my workout and fitness challenges. I’m heading into Month 3 of Fitter U Fitness. In just a few hours, Yuri is releasing Fitter Than The Pros; and I am just a month away from more 5Ks, an upcoming 10k, and perhaps even another half-marathon!
So, with the change of the season comes a clear focus – it’s time to settle in and enjoy every moment! Any suggestions for changing things up with the change of the season?
- Shannon
I’m also looking forward to Autumn and the Fall race schedule. Nice job balancing all you do with work, family, and running.
I love it Shannon. You workout more in one day than most people do in a week. Please share your secrets.
Ha! Thanks, Yuri! My only “secret” is that I MAKE time for it all. I fully understand the concept behind people saying that they “do not have enough time to workout”. Time is a strange thing. Some days seem so long while others seem to be moving at warp speeds – but yet, they’re the same 24 hours. So, I believe that we can manipulate our time – but that the method of manipulation has to evolve with just about every single day.
For example, I don’t think that simply deciding to wake up an hour early every day to workout will be an ultimate solution for most of us. There are days when you stick to the plan, make yourself wake up an hour early, and things just happen – you awake to find that your child isn’t feeling well that morning and is already awake, you check your email while you digest your pre-run fuel to discover an unexpected and rushed project for work that requires your immediate attention, or any number of situations that take you away from your goal of working out that morning. So, the trick is the be flexible – move the goal from working out an hour earlier than everyone else was SUPPOSED to be awake to working out at noon. If something happens on the lunch hour, move the goal again – commit to taking time in the early afternoon. If that fails, make it an evening or nighttime workout…and if the day completely gets away (which can certainly happen), move a rest day around in the week.
I always plan one day off within the week. Sometimes, I go ahead and do a little light workout on a planned day off anyway, just for the heck of it – but most of the time, I have one day in seven that is there for me to play with. So, if I plan for my rest day to be on a Saturday and a Tuesday becomes an impossible day, and I just can’t squeeze in the workout time that I wanted, I just count Tuesday as the rest day and make Saturday a day to workout. Even if I don’t get a full workout in on that Saturday, at least I’ve done something, so I feel much better about myself. And, if I have to have two rest days that week, so be it…the next week will be a completely new week with new challenges and new opportunities.
I think that time spent working on fitness, reading about fitness, etc is so important – too important to let everything else stand in the way of using that time for our own benefits. Shuffling things around is very, very hard – and I am certainly not an expert on any of it. There are many, many days where I feel frustrated about juggling it all – but developing a routine, being excited about the routine, but knowing that the routine has to be ultra-flexible helps to keep me going. Oh…and I have these really cool tools that help out a lot, too…they’re called Treadmill Trainer and Fitter U Fitness! (: