March 19th, 2008
If you lack on-going motivation for exercising and feel like you don’t have time for it, this blog is for you! But in order to understand the steps you need to take to help you, it is important first what is often the true hidden reason women say “I don’t have time to exercise.”
Time is a rare commodity these days. But, do women who are regularly physically active actually have more time than those who aren’t?
Women who are regularly active don’t have more time, but they do create time for exercise. What tends to distinguish the “I don’t have time” women is that they don’t prioritize being physically active. (Caveat: Women living in extreme circumstances such as mom’s with a newborn, women working 2-3 jobs to make ends meat do truly have less leisure time available for an activity such as exercise.)
The real question is why do some women prioritize fitting physical activity into their days and others don’t?
One reason is that the women who prioritize physical activity do so because it constitutes an important aspect of their self-care; it reduces their stress and enhances their sense of well-being. Their daily quality of life is enhanced when they are physically active, and diminished whey they are not - so they are very motivated to fit it in! These women do what I call “want-based” physical activity.
In contrast to that group of women, most of us consider being physically active as a “should”; something that we are “supposed to do” rather than something that feel we need or actually want to do. We don’t consider physical activity as an essential aspect of our self-care. In fact, “should-based” physical activity can feel draining, more like a self-care detractor! Who really has time in their day for another “should”!?
The deeper differentiator between women with “want-based” and “should-based” physical activity isn’t how much time they have, it is how they personally experience being physically active.
The “want-based” women personalize and tailor physical activity to their likes and desires. They do what makes them feel good, what reduces their stress and gives them energy. In general, women who do the “should-based” exercise tend to follow other people’s recommendations, including what the media and/or “experts” say constitutes the RIGHT way to exercise and be fit. But this “should-based” approach doesn’t lend itself to being sustainable nor to being a life-enhancing experience. And there is no RIGHT way to exercise.
The majority of American women fall into the “should-based” category regarding exercise and physical activity – and don’t do it consistently. This is because of the predominant exercise prescription that we have learned from our culture during the past 25 years.
Importantly, I’ve found that “should-based” women can become “want-based” by learning how to tailor physical activity to themselves, their desires/likes, and lives. If you want to transform your relationship with physical activity to be “want-based” you can do the following:
1) Make a conscious decision that you WANT TO start getting the incredible self-care benefits that physical activity brings (improved mood and sleep, etc.);
2) Decide what experiences you want to have from physical activity (Reduced stress? Social time with friends? Etc.)
3) Chose a physical activity that will give you that experience(s). (Reduced stress? Try walking outside in nature; Social experience? Ask a friend or family member to take a walk, or join a gym with you.)
4) Plan it into your day, and give yourself permission to leave whatever you are working on/accomplishing to do your planned physical activity.
5) Evaluate whether the physical activity you chose gave you the experiences you wanted. If it wasn’t a positive experience, try a new type of physical activity, a different teacher, or try a lower intensity, try a different time of day, etc.. (Figuring this out can be a process that may take some experimenting to figure out, but it is worth it.)
6) Decide that enhancing YOU AND YOUR SENSE OF WELL-BEING ARE WORTH spending time on.
7) See a good, short article about developing intrinsic motivation by Jay Kimiecik at http://psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-20000101-000021.html.
If you have any feedback, comments, or questions, please add a comment here or email me at michelle@essentialsteps.net.
Posted in Women's Motivation | 2 Comments »
January 8th, 2008
By focusing our New Year’s resolutions and efforts on the “outcomes” (e.g., losing weight, getting organized) we often rush into the behaviors that we hope will get us there. But, it is the BEHAVIORS THEMSELVES that determine our ultimate success and our ability to persevere over time.
We should think about the behaviors that are essential to achieving our desired goals and choose one to focus on at the beginning of this important endeavor. It is important to understand that changing eating habits and becoming more physically active are VERY different behaviors and should be treated as such. The conventional approach to lose weight suggests focusing on both diet and exercise concurrently. If your goal is to lose as much weight as you can quickly starting to diet and exercise at the same time will get you the best results. But if your goal is to achieve a fairly large weight loss goal and/or you want to SUSTAIN the weight you lose, think about a different approach.
Changing your eating habits and learning how to make exercise a regular and consistent part of your life at the same time is very challenging. Eating and exercise each have their own “tasks” and “rules” associated with them. Both require distinct discipline, and have associations with separate sets of emotions (often negative). Think about how likely it is that we can learn how to integrate these two very distinct behaviors into our lives so we can sustain them both over time? You know if your previous efforts to initiate diet and exercising at the same time have worked for you long-term. If they have, continue to do it. If they haven’t, why not try a different approach?
Posted in Women's Health, Women's Self-Care | No Comments »
December 29th, 2007
To answer this fundamental question I have to tell you about a study I conducted. In 1994 while at the University of Michigan, I researched with Vic Katch and others whether exercise could help breast cancer survivors decrease depression and anxiety symptoms. The data showed that the breast cancer survivors who exercised significantly decreased their depression and anxiety levels, compared to the control group that did not exercise. I thought that was the end of the story…
Three months after the study ended, we asked the study participants to come back to participate in focus groups. The survivors talked about how wonderful exercise had made them feel both mentally and physically. Of course, I was thrilled to hear how much exercise was benefiting these women!
But I was then shocked to discover that almost everyone had stopped exercising, when their commitment to the study had ended. I asked the study participants: “Why did you stop exercising when it had made you feel so good?” They gave me many answers. These women said that they had stopped exercising because of their many daily responsibilities - cooking and cleaning, chauffeuring children, taking care of others, etc.
After listening to the reasons why these women had stopped exercising it became clear that their barriers were not due to being cancer survivors, but from just having internalized women’s cultural roles and responsibilities. The epiphany I had was that although these breast cancer survivors had been comfortable making a commitment to exercise to fulfill our study requirements, they had not felt comfortable committing to exercise just to improve their own health and well-being!!
Moreover, that women who had faced a life-threatening illness had difficulty prioritizing their own health and wellness demonstrated exactly how deeply women have internalized being the caregiver of others but not necessarily themselves.
Do you relate to this? Over the years I have been amazed by how many women do. The BIG question is, if we feel this way do we want to CONTINUE doing so? Why?/Why Not?
What types of things do you do to help you expand your care-giving role to include yourself?
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December 1st, 2007
The question I posed in the title has been the driving force of my professional life since 1994. But before I talk about this question I want to define “women’s essentialsteps”. Generally, essentialsteps are the things women do to take care of themselves. I use this term more specifically to refer to physical activity because physical activity constitutes the essentialsteps for women’s continued health and well-being.
Why? There is a huge body of research showing many many many amazing physical health, mental health, and quality of life benefits from physical activity. Regular physical activity reduces the risk of getting breast and colon cancer, heart disease, diabetes, osteoporosis, among many other things. It helps reduce the re-occurrence of breast cancer. It staves off developing Alzheimer’s disease. It improves cognition, memory, and intelligence. It enhances well-being and mood, even as well as anti-depressants. Physical activity acts as a “wonder drug” on our mind and body. So why don’t we all get regular doses of physical activity then????
This is THE question of the day! Everyone wants to know the answer to this question. I have spent the past 14 years thinking about and researching why women don’t sustain physically active lives. I’m not going to present my resume here, but I’ve spent over 11 years studying this through a few graduate degrees and research at the University of Michigan and working directly with women over years in the community. One of the reasons women don’t sustain physically active lives because they ARE NOT MOTIVATED TO do it. That takes us to the next question. Why aren’t women motivated? I actually believe that I’ve figured this out. This answer represents part one of two posts regarding “why women don’t take their EssentialSteps?”
Women may be motivated to START exercising but they don’t STAY motivated to do it. My interest is in THE SUSTAINABILITY of physical activity. Many of us get motivated to start exercising when we are making New Year’s Resolutions, when “bathing suit” weather is approaching, and/or for an upcoming trip, Bat Mizvah or Wedding. Does this sound familiar? So, we typically start exercising for reasons related to changing our body shape or weight. I’ve discovered over the years and published about the problems associated with women taking this approach to exercising.
- We often have unrealistic goals for what exercise will actually do to our bodies and can’t achieve them. (Believe me, we’ve been sold a lot of hooey from companies marketing their fitness products and services.)
- We are exercising FOR AN EVENT. When that event is over, we have no reason to continue.
- We select physical activities aiming to “burn calories and lose weight” or “tone up”; most of which we don’t enjoy. In addition we may exercise so intensely to achieve our body-change goals that we just can’t sustain it for very long OR we injure ourselves. In addition, for some of us, exercising actually reminds us that we don’t feel comfortable with our bodies. Whichever reason it is, we don’t continue for very long.
- So, the approach that we take to exercising is one we’ve learned to take in our culture, and I call it the “Vicious Exercise Cycle”. We just keep doing it the same way, time and time again. Hence “vicious”. But my friend and colleague Harriet recently mentioned that there are two meanings to the “Vicious Exercise Cycle”. We are stuck in the same cycle over and over again. But the cycle is ALSO vicious; it is cruel and brutal because it keeps us at war with our bodies and consistently leads us to feel like failures. Given this, WHY WOULD WE STAY MOTIVATED TO EXERCISE OVER TIME?????
I’d love to hear your reactions to this, as well as your thoughts and experiences regarding your personal difficulties with staying motivated to exercise.
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