Internal Drive

Tomorrow will be Friday, April 1st.

As we in the Mid-Atlantic shift from an unusually long lasting winter to the four weeks of Spring before Summer starts on May 1st, I'd like to begin an exercise regiment that I can begin, continue and never end. In the past I've always been able to begin an exercise program, but it's the continuing/maintaining aspect that's been problematic. Whether it be weather, work, family or my Type 1 Diabetes, I've always had a ready made excuse available to quit doing the exercise program long before the desired outcome has been achieved. So I'll ask you, what do you do to keep the motivation factor going when you want to give up?

Here are a few bullet points to better describe what I enjoy and what I don't enjoy:

• I don't enjoy running just to run!! A lot of individuals say that running by yourself allows you to think about various subjects that invade your brain when you're on the road. The only subject I think about when running alone is when is it going to be over!! Running with another individual or with a group may be different because of the interaction factor, but now all of the sudden your exercise program has become a group exercise program and at the end of the day I don't want to have to rely on other people to get me in shape (see title of post!!)

• I very much enjoy running when there is a ball in play. I love to play basketball, soccer, volleyball, tennis, team handball etc. You get the idea. It doesn't ever feel like running when there's a purpose to it. The problems with the above mentioned activities are numerous. Multiple individuals working around varying schedules and available resources to just name a few. But again, I'm counting on all of these other entities for my workout benefit.

• I don't enjoy getting up at the crack of dawn to workout. I've never been a morning person and I don't know if I can ever become one.

• I do enjoy working out at night. That's probably because for the majority of my adult life that's always been when athletic activities have taken place due to everyone's schedules.

So as I've been writing this I can summarize by saying that I don't like to run by myself, I like playing with others, I can't stand working out early and I've always participated in sports that are played at night.

But my worry is that by relying on other individuals, read team sports as a middle aged male, I'm not owning my own workout program long term.

I'm thinking I really need to look into a bike of some sort. Less pounding and wear and tear on the knee joints and I can do it on my own for a long time. Now I will probably have to adjust my workout schedule somewhat because it's not entirely safe to constantly bike in the dark, but we've got a fairly safe rather large neighborhood that I could probably map out a nice little route to circumnavigate around a few times a week.

So that's the plan. I'm going to start looking for a bike and pray that my internal drive will keep me motivated to work out an exercise plan to help with the really important things in my life, my wife and two sons.

Look for posts in the coming weeks about what model I've chosen and how I'm currently doing.