Since starting my new job I had become aware that more than ever all I was doing was sitting. Either on trains to and from work, or at my desk at work. Add to that a free flowing supply of soft drinks, tea, biscuits, crisps and the occasional ‘cake day’ and it was clear that I needed to do something about exercise.
Fortunately my employer has a deal with a local fitness club for a discounted rate. And when I say local, I mean I can literally walk away from my desk, and be getting in the pool within about 8 minutes. So I have started going 3 times a week. twice at lunchtimes and once after work mid week.
I am historically not terribly good at sticking to any kind of fitness regime. This time may be no different, however I have been thinking about the last time I stuck at it for a good length of time and it has something importantly in common. That is proximity and ease of getting to the gym. The only reason I stopped last time was that I moved away from where I had been going to a gym and where I moved to had nothing ‘nice’ within a similar convenient range.
This is kind of an odd thing, the whole point is to be active & get fit. I’m often going to spend 20-30 minutes running, or at least on a cross trainer. And yet put the gym itself more than about 10 minutes away and suddenly it is all too much effort.
Obviously the main benefit here is that I can go during a lunch hour, and get a reasonable 30 mins swimming done. If it were any further away it would become impractical at lunch time, and I really have no other good time to dedicate to fitness. Certainly I have little enough time in the evenings as it is without trying to get to the gym a few times a week.
Of course at the moment there is no indication at all that any weight is being lost, but if I’m offsetting cake day, then that’s probably good enough 😉