Health Fitness and Barriers — EngagingConflicts.com
It’s New Year’s Day — Happy New Year to us all! Most of us will at least consider resolutions to do or be better in 2007, and, for many of us, getting fitter will be one of them. Will we follow them?
Jane E. Brody, New York Times Personal Health columnist urges us, “To Avoid ‘Boomeritis,’ Exercise, Exercise, Exercise” in her December 19th column (note: a TimesSelect membership may be necessary for access) — as she says, citing Dr. Nicholas A. DiNubile, an orthopedic surgeon at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, “evolution ha[s] not kept up with the doubling of the human life span in the last 100 years. To counter the inevitable declines with age, we have to provide our bodies with an extended warranty,” i.e., fitness.
Yet, while most of us know the benefits of exercise, few of us exercise enough, or exercise consistently enough. Why? There’s a good article available for free download posted at Change This.com, by Michale Gonzales, Ph.D., a licensed clinical psychologist. As he says in his introduction:
With all the data there is about why people should exercise, why do they still have a tendency not to? As there are many types of exercise an individual can choose, not exercising is also a choice. No one can write a book or a scientific paper that will fully explain why some people do not exercise or why they exercise erratically. For this answer one really need[s] to look within. This paper is written to help people do just that — look within.
The quick answer to the question of why an individual does not exercise has to do with time, motiviation and worthiness. These factors will be addressed in this paper: finding time, getting motivated, and believing that he or she is worth the time and effort necessary to get healthier and more fit.
I won’t see you at the gym … my first fitness resolution is to walk more, first. But walk more, I will!
