All of us have things to do, and most of us have reasons why we are not doing them.
A year or two ago I decided to start walking for exercise each morning. But before I began, I decided I needed a new pair of walking shoes. If only I had a new pair of walking shoes — $100 walking shoes — I knew I would start walking. After buying the shoes, I decided I needed socks. Yes, I most definitely needed thicker socks with more advanced walking technology embedded in them somehow to help me walk. After the socks came a new pair of headphones and better walking music. I spent days organizing songs into playlists by their BPM (beats per minute) so that I would have slower songs toward the beginning and endings of my walks with more intense ones in the middle. Along with my new music playlists I also installed a bunch of apps on my phone that I would need to walk. This included not one but two different apps to track my walking paths, distances and times, and another one that allowed me to track my daily calorie intake. And then I had to spend a bunch of time getting all those apps to talk to one another along with my Facebook, Twitter and Google+ accounts.
Somewhere in the middle of all that madness, I found the time to walk a couple of times.
Those putting off fitness and exercise are not the only ones who have mastered the art of procrastination; writers have been doing it for years. In the old days this meant sharpening one’s pencils (multiple pencils) just so, having the right paper, the right lighting, and the right chair at the right desk before writing the first word. Of course in today’s world it’s less about pencils and more about our computers. I remember halting a writing project one time after I had become convinced that my current keyboard would no longer do. After driving around to Walmart, Staples and Best Buy and not finding what I wanted, I ordered a new keyboard from Amazon and waited a few days until it arrived before continuing. I wish I could say that was the least expensive purchase I ever made in an attempt to stall progress on a project. “If only I had a laptop that were slightly faster than this one…”
Enter Regina Mayer, a fifteen-year-old girl from Germany. Regina really wanted a horse to ride but her parents wouldn’t buy her one, so instead she strapped a saddle to the family cow and taught it how to jump.
Suddenly, waiting until I have a FitBit to start walking seems a bit foolish.
In various interviews, Quentin Tarantino has admitted he writes all of his scripts by hand. George R. R. Martin writes his stories using an old DOS based computer and ancient word processor (WordStar 4.0). Danielle Steel has written more than 100 novels using a manual typewriter.
You don’t need a thousand dollar computer to write a best-seller or a thousand dollar guitar to learn how to play a few chords. You don’t need a $100 pair of shoes, name brand socks, or a smartphone full or apps to start walking. You don’t need a dedicated recording studio to start a podcast, or top of the line art supplies to start drawing or painting. Do you see where I’m going with this?
Sometimes, a cow’s good enough.
I admire anyone that starts an exercise program. It is really really really tough. I started probably about 10 years ago with running and it had taken me nearly 6-7 months to run one mile without slowing down and walking. There is an actual physical education of the body and brain to be able to regulate your breathing, pace, muscles etc. to be able to do what you want it to do. I wish schools would take PE seriously.
I always tell everyone starting an exercise program is: G—O —S—L—O—W. Don’t over exercise, don’t do anything more than 10% with what you do now and then very slowly increase it. A lot of people starting out go from 0 mph to 100 mph and then they get injured and then it takes months or longer to recover (if ever). Being overly conservative is vital. If you feel any pain at all just stop and recover a few days. If you have an injury wait till you no longer feel pain and then add two weeks to that.