I read in a book once that using laziness as a reason for not exercising isn’t actually a reason at all. That’s because saying you don’t exercise because you’re lazy is circular reasoning. You don’t exercise because you’re lazy. You’re lazy because you don’t exercise. An excuse for an excuse for an excuse…

The statement really struck me because I’d become convinced that I was just plain lazy and that’s all there was too it. I would have to get past my lazy ways if I ever wanted to exercise.

The book went on to say that not wanting to exercise has a lot less to do with laziness and everything to do with why you don’t like exercise.

Those healthy maintainers among us have learned to love exercise. The sweat, the heart pounding, the exhaustion. To them, it’s a high. For the rest of us, it’s unpleasant, and something you may not even realise is keeping you from exercise could be the root of your so-called laziness.

To figure out the real reasons I don’t like exercise, I did what any logical person would do: I exercised. What better way to find out?

The first thing that struck me when I paid attention to where my discomfort was springing from (the first thing that made me slow down) was breathlessness. I hate being breathless. It makes me feel like I’m suffocating. I can’t even handle having my head all the way under the blankets because the air gets stuffy and I feel like I’m suffocating.

Ding, ding, ding! Reason number one.

Reason number two is a bit more complicated: Sweating.

I like sweating. I love working so hard that my bra and shirt are soaked through, getting so gross that I have to take a shower no matter how exhausted I am because I wouldn’t dare touch my dirty skin or clothes to the bedsheets. (And I imagined I smelled, too.)

But I also don’t like sweating. Sweating any less than what I described above is uncomfortable for me. Why? I sweat when I get nervous. I’m a big girl, so I sweat doing things other people don’t sweat doing. And, of course, the good ol’ ‘girls don’t sweat’ routine some of us grew up with.

So, sweating a little and breathlessness.

Knowing the real reasons behind my ‘laziness’ made me finally feel like I could tackle exercise. Sure, I have a long way to go, but working to get past or around uncomfortable things is something to work on rather than simply a forever label like laziness that keeps you from even trying.

When I was just lazy, I couldn’t do anything but make myself feel guilty for being such a lazy person.

Now I can do breathing exercises to help and work out less fast but longer. Working out longer will help me to sweat more, to get me past that ‘feeling a little yucky’ threshold to the ‘I’m so sweaty because I worked damn hard!’ feeling.

Little steps…