Every Little Bit Helps

When it comes to exercise, my new mantra is "every little bit helps." Having that mindset is helping me exercise more consistently, and earlier in the day. 

I've only been exercising on a regular basis for a few years. I wish I would have started earlier. Maybe my osteoporosis would be less advanced. Maybe I would have been healthier as I entered menopause. But living with regrets and "maybe's" doesn't help. Move on and carry on!

I've had a bad habit of waiting to exercise until the end of the day. I put it off for as long as possible. Then I would get too tired and it would be too late to do some of the exercises. "I'll do those tomorrow," has been my mantra for too long. It became a vicious cycle of staying up too late, having to rush in the morning, and punting certain exercises until the weekend, if then. And of course the exercises that I wasn't doing were the ones I most needed to do - the ones that benefit my bones the most. The ones that are the most challenging. 

So for the past three days, during my three-day weekend, I have kept to a different schedule. Well, almost. One day I didn't. But anyway, I have started the day with my bed exercises. I don't know the names for all the exercises. Leg lifts - 50 of each leg. Clams - 60 of each leg. Bridges - 40. Stay in the bridge position for 90 seconds. The leg lifts and clams are done with one-pound weights. Then I hold each leg to my chest for a count of 25. 

Then with the one-pound weights I sit on the edge of the bed and do leg lifts - 50 on each leg. I'm trying to add an elbow to opposite knee touch for 50 times, but I can't do that every time yet. 

Next I move to the bathroom for balance and leg exercises. I do 8 minutes of balance exercises - one foot in front of each for a total of four times, then standing on one foot each for a total of four times. I do 60 foot stomps on each leg. And sometimes toe raises - forty to fifty. 

The hardest exercise for me to do every day are my arm weights. They are SO important and they take less than ten minutes - why do I procrastinate? They are usually the last exercise I do before I go to bed. So now I am trying to do them in the morning.

The whole time I was doing my other exercises this morning, I was thinking about my arm exercises. Correction: I was thinking about NOT doing my arm exercises. I was trying so hard to procrastinate. And then I remembered my mantra: "Every little bit helps." Just start doing them. Attempt the usual 20 reps of each exercise. If I can only do 10, at least I did some. 

I did the 20 reps of each arm exercise. Success!

On the days I work at the library, this schedule will not work. I don't have the time or the energy to do this much exercising then. Even if I can do a modified schedule during the week and the full schedule on the weekend, that's a good start. 

"Every Little Bit Helps"

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