Thursday, March 21, 2013

Clean Your Apartment & Workout Too Part 1

This post was supposed to simply be a workout that you can do at home, while you clean your place. Harmless, right? As I started writing, my heart opened up to another issue and that is really sticking with something, even if day by day the results seem small. I've seen so many examples of this with people I know recently, and apparently my heart needed to release it. Part 2, is an actual workout you can put into practice to make cleaning your house/apartment/whatever, fun and workout beneficial!

Often, I hear the excuse, "I don't have time to exercise." I myself often find myself thinking, "I don't have time, energy, etc to clean my space."

The truth is, we all have time. Maybe we don't all have 90-minutes a day, but we all can find 10-20-30 minutes a day to exercise and on somedays longer, if needed to hit your goals.

We can find the time.

But, you have to want it. You see I want to keep my car, purse, apartment, kitchen, bathroom, closet (need I go on?) clean, but the truth is, if I don't set this as a priority or treat it with importance, it happens infrequently. Yesterday, I dumped out my purse on my bedroom floor (in the middle--because ideally this means I'll pick it up faster). For me, this is how I force myself to clean, create an even bigger mess that has to be taken care of. Today I pulled out all the change and put it in a cute box and stacked up the dozens of receipts that had given my purse the resemblance of a trash bag....change needed!

So the above is a funny example, but how often do we treat our bodies and health this way?

"I'll start tomorrow." (no--tomorrow doesn't exist now--today is it)

"I ate a banana today (and kept all my other crappy eating habits). I was healthy today!" (be sure not to kid yourself)

Is your health/weight/food choices/workout decisions/stress management techniques/etc/etc/whatever you need to make yourself better, a priority? Or is it something you only handle when it becomes so severe, like the receipts flying out of my purse, that you only take action at crisis?

No matter what it is: moving your body more, stopping your ice cream binge, halting an addiction, speaking up for yourself more, believing in yourself, training for that half marathon you've always wanted to run, taking that dance class you've been terrified to sign up for....

Whatever it is for you, you CAN do it. You CAN step up and say, I'm all in to hit my goal.

You may need support.

I believe as humans we are designed to be in community and help each other.

Let someone step into your life and encourage you, challenge you and uplift you.

Do you need to dump so trash (old receipts) on your bedroom floor and day by day pick up the pieces? The trash represents past failures, negative people, your situation if you are unhappy with it.

Dump it all out and start fresh today, even if the changes seem insignificant right now. In my opinion, any change that you make for the better, is significant. I don't care how small it is (or how small you think it is). If you are trying to save up money and you put away $5 a day for 30 days, does it look significant? Not really. But if you weren't doing that last month and you continued to do this for 90 days, you'd have $450 (the cost of an iPad mini and some accessories!)

What if you did the same for your health? Just using exercise as an example, let's say you ran for 15-minutes a day (literally just a random example kind of/sort of equivalent to putting away $5 a day!). Let's say in 15-minutes, you expend 125 calories. In 90-days, you would have run 10,800 calories or 3 pounds. Maybe that's not a huge deal and maybe your goal is bigger. But look back 90 days, did you hit your goal of losing weight?

This example can be applied to any goal you have. Let's say you want to be able to do a pullup. If you start from zero and practice several times per week, over time you'll get to your goal--but it may take time.

Stick it out and know that the other side is positive and empowering!

By the way, this is soo not what I was about to post about, but it was on my heart. Part 2 is a workout that you can do, at home, while cleaning up your space!

In health & prosperity,

Monica


3 comments:

  1. Monica, I love this. Thank you for posting. I have needed a kick in the knees to kick start my exercise and eating habits and I keep procrastinating it. I will commit today that starting tomorrow morning I will exercise each morning for at least 15 minutes and I know the slight edge will work for me instead of against me.

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  2. LivinOutLoud..I love it! The slight edge mentality is totally working for you (and everyone!). It's not about being perfect but about moving forward and making small steps to get better, all the time!

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