Basic Pursuits

Every day I see articles like, "7 Tricks to Keep You Motivated to Exercise" or "Five Reasons You Should Exercise."

The tricks and the reasons are good, but articles like this fail to address a simple but powerful reason why long term exercisers are successful.

They have formed a habit and their habit makes them feel better. Exercise - feel better. Repeat until addicted.

So exercise success depends on habit and habit depends on feeling good. It's simple, yet it's so easy to screw up. One of the most common mistakes is exercising to burn calories. Believing that you can burn off a big chunk of chocolate cake with a little extra effort on the treadmill is one of the greatest popular delusions in America today. So you work harder and harder and feel worse and worse. Feeling bad has the expected effect. You start to hate exercising and sooner or later you quit.

If you want to benefit from all of the improvements to your being that exercise brings, enjoy exercising. Cultivate the habit by having your exercise make you feel better. If that requires you doing less, do less. Just do it consistently. As your body adapts, you will naturally do more.

Feel good. The habit is the goal, not how many bench presses you do today or how far you run.