It is January, my least favorite month of the year. Time for those ridiculous resolutions most of us make and rarely keep. If one of your soon-to-be broken promises falls under the heading "get fit now," it's no wonder. Every American, from sea to shining sea, knows by now that fitness is important to our physical health, not to mention our self-esteem. The truth is, at least in my small world, if you don't walk, run, bike, ski, hike, swim, rock climb, play tennis, lift weights, practice yoga or participate in any number of age-appropriate group activities, then you best beware: the Fitness Police have you in their sights.
Should you also have the bad luck to be more than five pounds overweight, your troubles are compounded. Those of us who don't own a valid gym membership, or a pair of tennis shoes that have pounded the pavement on a city street or at a recreation center, are often made to feel we are somehow less than stellar citizens. Yes, the dreaded Fitness Police are alive and thriving especially so in January.
The Fitness Police understand the herd mentality that rises to the fore each and every January 1. Bloated from an excess of holiday cheer, we are easy prey for the onslaught of advertisements, commercials, and yes, even well-meaning words from those we love who promise a "new you in the New Year." Feeling overweight and sluggish, it is difficult to ignore the barrage of enticements that urge us to sign on the dotted line for a 12-month gym club membership or enroll in a diet program that guarantees to vanquish those newly acquired pounds in a few scant weeks.
When January rolls around, and I mean that both literally and figuratively, many of us are more than eager to hand over our hard-earned dollars for the opportunity to beat our bodies to a pulp or starve ourselves senseless in a valiant effort to get in shape. Unfortunately, by February most of those same gym cards will be languishing in a junk drawer along with used rubber bands, paper clips, and an assortment of other odds and ends. As for the diet, well, suffice it to say that hunger trumps good intentions every time. But by then it is too late: your money and your will power are gone -- only the excess pounds remain.
According to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Trust for America's Health (2010), 38 of our 50 United States have obesity rates over 25 percent. There is no denying that we are a grossly overweight nation whose inhabitants worship at the shrine of fast and packaged foods. My gripe is that we are hounded from Halloween through New Year’s Eve to buy, prepare, and consume every form of indulgence with reckless abandon. Then, on January 1, those very same magazines, newspaper ads, TV commercials, family, and friends who tempted us with every form of decadence, now expect an abrupt reversal in our behavior.
I don't think so. My advice: If you intend to make a commitment to health and fitness, then do it in slow, thoughtful way. Do not be bullied by the Fitness Police!
On a more personal note, it's not that I don't exercise. I do. And it's not that I don't watch my calories. Again, I do (about 75.5% of the time). But, if a truth squad were to hold my feet to the flame, I would have to admit (a) that to impress my friends and family, I sometimes embellish the facts regarding the actual amount of time spent at the gym or on my at-home exercise equipment, (b) that the picture of me grunting and gasping after a mere 30 minutes of semi-strenuous activity is not a very attractive one (hence the real reason my workouts are generally in the privacy of my own house), and (c) that I traded in my teeny weenie tennis togs and dance leotards years ago and now work out in comfy sweat clothes from the clearance rack at a local discount store. Age and attitude do have their advantages, as some of you may know.
For a change of pace, I have decided that this year my resolution is to not make any diet or exercise resolutions at all – to ignore the January hype put forth by the
Fitness Police. After decades of failed attempts to honor said promises, I have decided instead to turn my attention to a more realistic endeavor such as cleaning out the ubiquitous cabinet drawer of long-expired gym membership cards and copies of diet program registrations. Doing so will clearly be a much more productive use of my time.