Recently, I’ve had a few people ask me how I manage to get family, work, volunteer work and exercise balanced…well to be honest, I can’t take the credit. A good friend of ours just published a book called, “Boardroom to Base Camp,” and in it, he has this exercise called: “The Balance Exercise.” It asks you take the hours in each week, subtract sleep and then divvy up the remaining hours to different things like: yourself, mission, spiritual, community etc. So when I was first completed the exercise it made me rethink how I approached each day because it clearly shows that we have a lot more time than we think. Just to give you an idea: I’m a work-at-home mom. That means I watch my son and also work about 8 – 10 hours each day; Monday – Sunday 😉 but not necessarily straight through.  Now I will admit that he does go to daycare one day per week so I can get out to meetings in and around the city, but that’s it. I also usually do a bit of volunteer work 3-4 times a week (sometimes more or less depending on what’s going on); I exercise 5-6 times a week ranging from 1-2.5 hours each time and on top of that, I make time to socialize with friends. I’m not saying a busy life is for everyone, but I am telling you that there’s a whole lot of time available to get this stuff done if you really want to! 

Anyway, with that I want to tell you about my awesome workouts both yesterday and today – I think the fact that it’s been above zero (well above) has really turned my attitude around. Even despite having another nasty cold again (and it’s quite nasty) I managed to do 35 minutes on the treadmill and another 20 minutes on the bike today! And yesterday was terrific as well. I completed my hill work on the treadmill (which I’m normally against) However, I started out at an incline of 2 and every 1.5 minutes, I moved it up. I believe when I was finished I was somewhere past 11. And I kept my speed at a steady 6! I was absolutely sweating out my cold, and it felt amazing. I’m not sure if I could have pushed much harder, but I’m completely satisfied with both workouts.

In the spirit of encouragement when I know some people are also having a rough time getting out with the transition of seasons and sickness, read this quote. I hope it’s as effective with you as it was with me! 🙂 HAPPY TRAILS!

“It is not the critic who counts, not the one who points out how the strong man stumbled or how the doer of deeds might have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred with sweat and dust and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; who, if he wins, knows the triumph of high achievement; and who, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”