I’m not sure if you’re a dog owner or not and I had never owned a dog until a few years ago. You could say I adopted two greyhounds! Maybe my parents didn’t take to dogs or the environment wasn’t suited to having dogs, I can’t really say for sure.
My ex-partner has been a dog lover all her life and I was introduced to Ruger and Bo when I met her. Since we split up, I have access to them and take them for walks – it’s a nice, mutual arrangement. It’s like having visitation rights!!
Dogs love to go for walks. They get very excited when you head anywhere near the front door and when you grab their leads, well it’s just chaos!!
The one thing that dogs don’t do is refuse to go for a walk and the opportunity to exercise. They don’t lie down in protest and refuse to move. [If they could talk], they wouldn’t say “Nah, not today, I don’t feel like going walking”!
They instinctively do it. They are raring to go. Maybe we should learn from this process.
When it comes to exercise, do you ever say “Nah, not today, I don’t feel like exercising”? Usually followed by any of these excuses:
• “I’m too tired”
• “Exercise is boring”
• “Exercise is just too hard”
• “I don’t have time to exercise”
Let me ask you this: If you were ill, would you have time for illness? I mean, would you be able to use excuses to abandon the illness? No, you couldn’t because the illness would take over and you would HAVE to make time to rest and recover.
So, why wait until you’re ill? Do something about your health right now and shun the excuses. Just like your dog, there should be no excuses IF you want to be fit and well.
Next time you go to exercise and feel an excuse coming on, act like your dog and just get up and do it – do something, whether it’s walking, swimming, lifting weights, Pilates etc. Find an activity you enjoy and do more of it.
The more we sit, the more our health suffers. Just be aware of your activity levels throughout the day and keep thinking of ways to encourage activity – taking the stairs is a great one. Why use the lift or escalator unless you really need to? Even more baffling is taking the escalator then just standing there rather than moving while you’re on it!
The reason I set up my group classes was to educate women on activity and effective exercise. You will only get stronger, fitter and healthier if you attend regularly. If you’d like to know more about my classes, here’s a link to my group timetable. Arrange to call in for a look and a chat for free –> GROUP CLASSES