Quote:
Originally Posted by Wannabeskinny
Are you listening to your doctor or are you listening to some bit of arbitrary information you don't even know where it came from? Stick to the facts, the doc says you have to exercise so start there. If you're not interested in sticking to 5min a day what makes you believe you can stick to 10-20?
This is an extremely good point, and needs to be addressed head on.
We've been led to believe a lot of BS regarding health, wellness, fitness, and weight loss. And a lot of it, we don't even realize we believe, even as it leads us to sabotage our efforts time and time and time again.
Things like:
5 minutes of exercise "doesn't count"
I'm not really exercising unless I go to a gym
I'm not getting any benefit unless I exercise until I feel severe pain or throw up (thanks for that Biggest Loser).
If I don't see impressive weight loss results immediately, or if I see a small temporary gain from water weight (which the body needs to repair and recover) it means the exercise isn't helping.
Only 30 minutes of sweating hard, or an hour at a comfortable pace "counts" and if I don't have the time or a convenient place, or if I can't do the minimum, it's not worth the effort.
These are all "normal" thoughts and beliefs and they're all complete BS. Start wherever you can. Increase as you feel comfortable. If you hurt yourself learn from your mistakes. If you're bored, find a way to be less bored (for me, music helps).
There are a thousand and one excuses you can use to avoid exercise. Boredom, impatience, and procrastination are at the top.
"Sticking to just 5 minutes a day" is NOT what is giving you a lack of interest. It's your lack of interest that is fueling the inner voices that are choosing to be uninterested and finding a way to justify the lack of interest.
The advice to start with 5 minutes was once unheard of. Then, weak, busy and sedentary people identified lack of time or inability as a demotivator.
You choose your motivators and demotivators, they do not choose you. Whether you start with 30 minutes or 1 minute, you choose whether, when, and why to gain or lose motivation.
Also, unless you remember and respect the source, "I read somewhere" just doesn't cut it as a reputable source of information. People can and do say and write all sorts of untrue crap. People's memories for written material is also unreliable. If you found and reread the original material, you might find that it came from a tabloid or other notorious source, or that the advice was geared towards a very specific group to which you do not belong (such as people barely able to stand, like I was)
Sound advice gets repeated by reputable sources, so rather than rely on your memory of "I read somewhere" advice, go directly to the reputable sources. The internet can be helpful, but only if you can evaluate and verify the reputation of the source.
This is a rhetorical question, so you don't have to answer, but if you went to the trouble to get cleared for exercise, why didn't you ask your doctor, when you had the chance, what type, intensity, and duration of exercise he had in mind?
If he had given you the "5 minute" advice, he might have had a good reason (and you should then ask more questions to find out those reasons and if this is a guideline or a requirement and the doctor's reasoning behind the advice).
You can always ask your doctor, "Is there any reason, I can't....."
I know I've thrown a lot at you, but this is really important stuff. There's so much crap advice "out there" that it's really important to develop the skills that will allow you to identify and sort through the crap to find the treasures of reliable information.