Raise your hand if you’re busy.

Raise your hand if you're a parent.

Raise your hand if you're tired.

Raise your hand if it’s hard to exercise because you're busy, parenting, and tired!

Pre-kids, I considered exercise a hobby. I would get up at 5:30 am to get to the gym for a quiet elliptical and strength session, or a cardio class of some sort. I’d have time to get home and get ready for work. My clothes fit well, I ate whatever I wanted, and I had the motivation to make exercise a hobby.

Fast forward 5+ years later, and my physical health has not only dropped from the hobby list, it has fallen off the page and landed on the floor. I step on it as I am doing my third load of laundry for the day, or picking up the toy trains, just avoiding eye contact with the equipment altogether.

I kept finding that my motivation to exercise wasn’t there. I wondered if it would ever come back. I wanted all the health benefits of exercise–more energy, feeling strong, and better sleep–but I didn’t want to actually do the work.

I wasn’t going to get more sleep to have more energy. I wasn’t going to get stronger without lifting heavy things. And I wasn’t going to sleep better by doing nothing to change my daily routine.

I eventually got to the point that I had to focus on my physical health because I needed those benefits. I had already had 4 knee surgeries and had gone through a back surgery after my second child was born. After dealing with the pain and recovery, I was suddenly motivated by how utterly weak I felt.

Part of my recovery from back surgery involved getting in the pool at my gym. I would swim laps (not fast) and I would use a jogging belt to jog in the deeper water. It felt amazing! I looked forward to the mornings that I would again get up at 6 to make it to the gym for my workout. I even found myself looking forward to the next session.

I realized that for me, exercise in this stage of life looks very different from exercise in my past. Pre-kids, I had a framework in my mind. Exercise was going to the gym and getting in my cardio for at least 30 minutes and doing a regimented strength segment. Anything less just wasn’t exercise, and wasn’t "worth it".

I found myself comparing how hard I had to work out pre-kids, to how hard I would have to work out today, with an expectation that I would achieve the same outcomes. Realistically, I knew getting my early 20’s body back was a long shot, maybe even impossible, but in my mind, that was my expectation. So is it any surprise that I wasn’t motivated to do the work when my expectation was so unrealistic?

No. I was thinking about exercise all wrong. Exercise, as it once was in my life, wasn’t going to work the same way for me today. I had to change the framework in my mind of what it looks like to exercise. So instead, I started to set intentions, not expectations.

When you're busy with kids and work, you might only have a quick 20 minutes to hop on a machine, or pull up a workout on your fitness app. I found that for me, the mindset of intentionally moving my body is such a healthier place for my mind to be than expecting results.

And so, I intended to move everyday. Some days I walked 10,000+ steps cleaning my house and doing laundry. Other days, I was busy doing yard work, mowing my lawn without the automatic accelerator on. My family likes to take walks; we often go for walks after dinner with the kids and our dog. Eventually, we invested in a fitness machine to have at home.

I learned that by intentionally moving, I enjoyed the process and focused less on the outcomes. When I did notice benefits like more energy, better sleep, and feeling stronger, it seemed to just happen as a result of the process.

The benefits for me of this new mindset have not only been physical, but mental as well. I had been holding my body hostage because I didn’t want to exercise as hard or as much as I used to. I finally understood that I needed to look at exercise as movement of the body, not as "working out." In this, I have found my motivation, my energy, and I look forward to each day that I get to intentionally move.

Health Perspectives

Exercising Intentions Over Expectations

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