Exercise Makes You Feel Better

One of the people on my Google group discussion list,
http://groups.google.com/group/health-scape, asked about ways to get
motivated to exercise. She said that she experiences depression and
that it's really hard to make herself get on the treadmill and stay
there long enough for a good workout. While I don't experience
clinical depression, I have certainly gone through bouts of being very
low and have experienced the apathy it causes in most everything
including exercising. This was most intense for me when perimenopause
set in about five years ago, also about the same time I decided to get
serious about fitness. Part of what follows comes from my own
experience and part is taken from information I found with a little
searching from the web site sited below.
When I decided to do something about fitness, I spent a lot of time
making myself exercise before it became something I really wanted to
do. I think this is fairly typical. And, if in addition, you cope
with depression, too, then that increases the challenge. Still, if
you exercise to the point of a really good work out, one that leaves
you a little sweaty, breathing hard and feeling tired and sore, then
you can begin to shift that apathy a bit. Your body releases
chemicals when you exercise that give you a natural boost. It's just
hard to make yourself work out to that point if you have the mind set
that you really don't want to exercise.
For more information about how exercise can lessen depression, or keep
it at bay when you're feeling good, check out this article,
"Depression and Anxiety: Exercise Eases Symptoms," from the Mayo
Clinic:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/depression-and-exercise/mh00043
This article is full of excellent information such as: "Doing 30
minutes or more of exercise a day, for three to five days a week can
significantly improve depression symptoms. But smaller amounts of
activity — as little as 10 to 15 minutes at a time — can make a
difference." and "Don't think of exercise as a chore. If exercise is
just another "should" in your life that you don't think you're living
up to, you'll associate it with failure. Rather, look at your exercise
schedule the same way you look at your therapy sessions or medication
— as one of the tools to help you get better."
Note that it is a two-page article and you need to click "next page"
to see all of it.
When doing cardio, something I find particularly boring, I read. If
it's a good book, then the time definitely goes faster. I also find
it motivating to workout in a fitness center with other people. While
this has its own set of challenges, once I get comfortable with the
center, I draw encouragement from those around me. It's a silent
encouragement as we mostly don't talk, but there's just something
reinforcing about other people choosing to do the same things I'm
doing.
The sticking point for most folks is that you have to push yourself
regardless of how you're feeling in order to get this all started.
And then you have to allow yourself to fail and quit and start back
again. Eventually, when you start to really feel and notice the
benefits, you begin to want to do it and it's not such a struggle.
It's an easy thing to say from this side of the battle. I can
remember listening to friends tell me similar things when I was trying
to get started and not believing them or wishing they'd just shut up
and admit that working out was a miserable activity. And it was
miserable for me initially. It was so foreign to my usual routine of
inactivity. I'd spent years being inactive and it wasn't easy to
force a change.
Keep at it and you can turn the corner too. I was telling someone
just the other day that it's finally starting to feel like a real life
change for me, something that could really become permanent. This has
been several years in the making and I'm not ready to call it a life
change yet, but forward progress is definitely being made!
Just remember that it's worth it because it's your fitness and
well-being that is at stake. You are so worth the effort!