A New Life's resolution - Day #74 (Intellectual)

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Day #74 - Intellectual

According to www.definitionofwellness.com, "The intellectual dimension of wellness encourages creative, stimulating mental activities. An intellectually well person uses the resources available to expand one's knowledge in improved skills along with expanding potential for sharing with others. An intellectually well person uses the intellectual and cultural activities in the classroom and beyond the classroom combined with the human resources and learning resources available within the university community and the larger community."
 
If you've been reading this blog for very long, hopefully you've picked up on the fact that I'm a big proponent of getting to know oneself.  I think this week's discussion of exercise and how it relates to the various dimensions of wellness provide me with a perfect opportunity to learn about myself.
 
As much as I would hate to admit it, this isn't my first go-round at the "exercise as part of my every day life" rodeo!  It feels like ever since I got out of college (that's been A WHILE!), this desire to make exercise less odious has been there.  It started out as a desire to be more attractive to the opposite sex.  While I was in college, I dated the same man for quite a long time and then the rest of the time, I assumed it would "just happen".  I knew that the men I was always interested in were interested in women much thinner than me, but I didn't realize that that was going to be true FOREVER.
 
So, as a way of being more attractive to a potential mate, I have tried any number of exercise programs since then.  Nothing ever stuck for very long until about 8 years ago.  It was then that I found "Body For Life".  In the 2 years that followed I dropped more weight than I ever had and gained a good opinion of myself physically for perhaps the first time in my life.
 
How did I do it?  Besides being religious fanatical about what I put into my body, I went to the gym at 5 AM EVERY MORNING.  I spent about 2 hours there every day lifting weights and doing cardio.  Now, if you know me, you know that I am NOT a morning person unless I'm up because I stayed up all night!  But I was still there putting in the time every morning.
 
Then about 6 years ago, Troy popped onto the scene and the early morning workout sessions were no more.  At the beginning of the year, I started going to the gym after work with a friend, but I was sick for several weeks and then daylight savings hit so it's lighter outside later into the evening, so we decided to go by our own schedules until the fall.  Consequently, I can find LOTS of other things to do in the evening after work than go to the gym!  So, other than walking to and from doggy daycare, my workouts have been very lacking.  UGH!  I feel like a total slug.
 

This is where my intellectual wellness with regard to exercise kicks in.  What I realized about those early morning workout sessions several years back was that by the time I got to work, I'd already put in my workout!  That tiny thought lifts a world of angst and worry off of my shoulders.  No more do I have to think about how crowded it's going to be at the gym that night after work.  No longer do I feel like I don't have any time to myself to relax.  If I simply change my schedule so that prep my clothes the night before, go to bed a bit earlier, and NOT hit the snooze button 10 times, life seems so much better.  The advantages of working on out in the AM (not having to THINK about exercising the rest of the day, getting the workout in before my brain has fully woken up) seriously outweigh the discomfort caused by pulling my butt out of bad that early.
 
Now if only I can remember this all when the morning comes.  {sigh}