Regular exercise taught me how to be self-disciplined

(From my original Blogspot)

I believe that what usually stands between a person and their goals is the efforts required of self discipline. I could live for many years and only dream of accomplishing my goals, or I could actually DO them. I am profoundly grateful for the discipline that I have learned through the years as I have become devoted to physical exercise.

Looking back, I can see that I haven't had a lot of discipline in my early life. As a child, my mother did not expect me to be disciplined. I would come home from school and do whatever I wanted, stay up as late as I wanted, and fall asleep on the heat vent in my school clothes. My room was always a huge mess, I ate piles of unmonitored ice cream in front of the TV (when I was a teenager my mom finally allowed TV watching to some degree), and I did my homework in the hallway in school only moments before it was due. Not exactly a portrait of health and discipline.

Life has taught me a lot. Having kids has taught me to have consistency. My husband has taught me to stick to things and finish them. I have matured enough to set my own goals that stem from my own values. But as of a few years ago, I still lacked a lot of discipline with exercise.

Almost four years ago I was at a physical low point. I was just having my fourth baby within seven years, and had only sporadically exercised. I used to get away with it, weight-wise, and I ate whatever I wanted (those days were over). In my 20's, that worked for me. But the years were catching up with me, and I was beginning to be in actual physical pain on a daily basis, in addition to looking pretty bad. During this pregnancy, I made a strong commitment to myself to regain my health as soon as I had delivered the baby. I remember eating an "awesome blossom" at a restaurant, all huge and pregnant, thinking "this kind of deep-fried life-style is going to end."

Thankfully, my decision to change wasn't wasted. I can only describe my devotion to improving my health as utterly gritty. I moved it to priority one. Since then I have exercised very consistently and improved my diet significantly. There have been ups and downs, and lots of hard work along the way. Of course, I feel wonderful now. I can run and work and play, and enjoy every minute of it. I've run lots of races of various lengths, and completed a triathlon. My body feels good!

But I have had to become a different person inside too. Getting myself moving every day has forced me to change my discipline level. My lack of discipline was exposed for what it was, and thankfully, I have improved greatly on it. Aside from my physical improvements, my inner improvements have been a vital part of my progress in life. The discipline that I have had to develop has helped me tremendously as I have since finished my bachelors degree, started my masters degree, and also worked on a whole slough of other personal goals. As my mind bursts with all of the things that I want to accomplish (as it almost always is doing), I have hope in achieving many more of them because of the grit I have had to develop through disciplined exercise.