Hooray! It’s time for Fit Five Friday! And what’s the best way to start out the year? Join us in the link up!

Your five amazing hosts – me, My First 5K and More, Running With Attitude, Runs with Pugs, Zenaida are here to make your Fridays fun!

Want to link up but not sure what to write about? We’ve got you covered! This year’s Fit Five Friday has TOPICS! We’ve created a schedule of prompts to help make Friday’s posting just a little easier. And of course you don’t have to go by this schedule, but maybe this helps to get your creative juices flowing.

This week: Five things that motivate me right now

Stats

Call me a nerd, that’s fine, I’m the first to admit it. It’s not all stats that I love, but some are just fun to track. I haven’t cared much about pace in the last several years (except for the few times I have) so that’s not really on my radar, but how many kilometers I’ve run, walked, or biked is interesting to me. Also I generally keep track of my spin bike classes and the stats I keep track of are slightly different to other activities, namely max HR and, admittedly, calories burned. The reason for that is I then I know it was a class I really enjoyed. If Im not digging it, my HR not not go as high. Calories burned is always taken with a grain of salt, but HR and calories burned tend to go hand in hand and again I know that it was a class I really liked.

I talked a little bit about a modest goal I have for this year, and while I’m slightly sidetracked by The Cough That Won’t Go Away, my statistics are already making me happy. The goal is 1KM walk minimum every single day (that’s 365KM walking a year) and one 5KM run/walk/jog per week (that’s 260KM running). Keep in mind it’s January 11th as of the time of writing this blog, which means I should have 11KM walking under my belt:

Obviously once the month is up the averages will change, so that stat I’m really look at is the total distance. Once my lungs will allow me to run again, I will make up the 5KM runs to make sure I hit my target for the year (I find it reasonable to not run right now, and don’t have any problem making up what I’ve missed due to illness, to achieve my goal for the year).

Realistic Challenges

Why “realistic”? Basically because I do know myself and I know when it’s something that probably won’t be achieved. But, “If it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you”. Ok, you got me there. I know. But honestly, why do things you don’t like to do in the first place? I don’t WANT to do a 5 Minute Plank. It won’t do anything for my social life and I won’t get any real reward from it because I will literally never plank again. Nobody wins here. . Burpees? Sure I’ve managed that challenge, even bought a tee shirt, but pretty much never did a burpee again. And you know what? I’m not missing them.

However, a realistic challenge like RED January? That I can do. The goal is: #moveeveryday. That’s it. Move every day. Not “75 Hard (days of doing things that won’t fulfil me in the end)”, not 30 days of different kinds of crunches, not 60 days of going without a donut (not possible). Just move every day. And I think I’m on my 3rd year of doing it? Starting to move every day again is getting me back on my daily habit. (Also, I get to talk about mental health on social media, and how moving can really help!)

Change in my own mind/ body

I almost didn’t put “/body” but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t motivated by body changes. Mostly, though, I’m motivated by my own change in how I think and feel about things and mostly how I am able to speak to myself in a different, kinder way. I’ve been working on this for a while and it really has been challenging with menopause thrown in, but each time I’m able to turn negative thoughts in to positive ones, this makes me very happy. And not just about myself (though that is a big project) but also about things that happen in my daily life, if someone is rude or a service wasn’t great or if I feel like I’m being bullied – recognising that it’s a “them” problem and not a “me” problem is something to be very proud of and is definitely motivating.

Signing up / Making plans

After Chicago I really felt like I never wanted to run a race again. Not Chicago’s fault of course. but I just didn’t want any pressure at all. I’ve been able to change that mindset and feel like signing up for a few races might be just what I need to at least have the motivation to get out and start running again!

I do think I’ll have to skip the 8K I signed up for that is at the beginning of February (because I haven’t run for 4 weeks now and not sure how that will go right now with my lungs on fire) and the race in March I hadn’t yet pulled the trigger. I’m going to not only do that, but on my walk last night I started visualising myself running the Half Marathon of Amsterdam in October. No promises right now, but that’s how quickly I can change my mind. (Side note – why is it when we can’t run we want to suddenly do all the races???)

IF I am going to do the Half then I will definitely plan on speaking with my running coach again. Will I? Won’t I? Only time will tell my friends.

People

Last but absolutely not least are the people I interact with regularly that motivate me. If you spend time actually getting to know people online and in person, people who do all they can every day to live a healthy and fit life (but still drink wine on the weekends and never say no to tacos), who overcome life stress, illness, family life, job stress, etc., and they still take time out to encourage YOU on a daily basis, you can’t possibly help but be motivated by that. And the best part is also giving it back! Courage, strength, honesty and showing a commitment to oneself is something you can aspire to and learn from and that definitely can motivate you.

People motivate me every single day. I don’t purposely set out to motivate others but if I do, I am so proud of that. In this crazy world, why not support and lift each other up? We can all help each other live our best life. In fact it’s the main reason I love my blogging friends so much – with friends like these you can pretty much achieve ANYTHING!

What Motivates You?

Join the Fit Five Friday Link-up!

Here are the guidelines:

• Your link should center around some kind of fitness (exercise, wellness, mental health, nutrition… the possibilities are endless!)
• Please link back to your hosts! It’s the right thing to do! 
• Share the link-up love by visiting and commenting on your hosts and at least two other Fit Five Friday bloggers!
• Feel free to share about Fit Five Friday on your social media! Tag #FitFiveFriday to get the word out!

Here are the guidelines:

• Your link should center around some kind of fitness (exercise, wellness, mental health, nutrition… the possibilities are endless!)
• Please link back to your hosts! It’s the right thing to do! 
• Share the link-up love by visiting and commenting on your hosts and at least two other Fit Five Friday bloggers!
• Feel free to share about Fit Five Friday on your social media! Tag #FitFiveFriday to get the word out!