Every child that was raised where recess still existed, knew that exercise was key to maintaining health and wholeness. Now, you may find that kids spend most of their time indoors in front of a wide variety of screens that are easily accessible to them and they spend only a couple minutes outside. My mother knew that this was coming for our generation. When I was young, my sister and I were only allowed to watch TV or play computer games (which at the time was the only source of a "screen") during the weekend. Even with that restriction, as my sister and I got older, and more technology came out, we still spent hours on the computer playing Sims 2 or watching old 2007 YouTube videos. It wasn't until this semester that I had an epiphany during finals week where I realized how important exercise is to your health. I was craving a good workout and decided to take ahold of life. It may be fun to catch up on "Orange is the New Black" or play Minecraft now and then. But when you think about it, what are all those tech-savy sources doing to your physical health?
At the age of six, my mom decided to put my sister and I on a swim team from a nearby pool in our neighborhood. After countless goggles and caps, two swim teams, eight moves in the same city and over a decade of hard work, swim team was important. Ever since then, my family has enjoyed swimming and find that it is a good outlet to working out. I have been wanting to go back to my roots since I entered college but found myself making excuses to go workout. "There's no pool around here", "It costs a lot of money to get a gym membership", "No one will go with me", or my favorite, "I don't have time to workout." These worries can build up and cause your goals to decline. When I finally decided to work out, I did. Last Wednesday, I decided to get a gym membership and it has been so rewarding to my health! My ultimate goal was to continue swimming and then slowly approach running again. I thought this would take me some time to do but in a little over a week, I was courageous and ran 6 miles! I haven't been able to do that in years! If I have been able to do this much in a week, imagine what could be accomplished in the weeks, months, and years ahead. This can happen to anybody!
If you want to be more alert, happier, lose weight, or get more sleep, try daily exercise. You can start slow and do yoga, stretching, take a short jog through your neighborhood, or even lift a couple of 10-pound weights. I decided to go all in and got a gym membership where I have access to a pool, weight room, cardio room, massage room, and even a tanning bed. Deciding to do all this means that you are putting yourself first in your life because you want to change your course of action. If you can't take the reigns on what you want to change, then no one else will. YOU are the only person who can force yourself to get motivated.
