I know, you read the title and immediately thought “oh this is some gym rat who goes insane if she doesn’t go to the gym everyday of her life”. Hi, welcome to the farthest thing from that, me! I danced for 15 years and in those years, I probably had a consistent gym plan for about 3 months. However, getting to college and dealing with all the stress it brings along with not dancing has really put a toll on my body. I decided, like the rest of the world, that my new year’s resolution was to start working out and get healthy for probably the 5th year in a row. To my own surprise, I’ve stuck to it better than I ever have! The goal is to workout every workday, and I haven’t hit that yet but going to the gym four times a week is something I have N E V E R accomplished, so yay me (Insert London Tipton gif)! With my academic schedule, the best time for me to workout is at about 8am. In college, this is practically 6am.
Do I have mornings I skip because I just can’t get out of bed? Absolutely. Once a week at least.
Do I hate doing 30 minutes of cardio when I just want to be curled up in my bed? HECK YEA
BUT I have to admit, I’m really starting to love this working out in the morning thing.
I know it sounds crazy, but I swear I have solid reasons:
I feel productive
You know those days where all of the sudden its 3pm and all you’ve done is gotten some food? I hate those kind of days because I feel so lazy and unproductive. Getting up in the morning and working out allows me to have my lazy day without feeling like a bum because hey, I worked out this morning.
My body feels better
I’ve learned that I get most of my inner stress out through physical means (dancing, running, meditating, yoga, you name it) and not having that last semester really was not good for my emotional health. Yea, I am sore a lot of the time because leg day kills me consistently, but its that good kind of hurt that you’re proud of. Plus, one day you’ll put on your leggings like normal but they’ll look a little better. You feel more toned. Those moments are truly great.
It makes me eat a healthier breakfast/actually eat breakfast
So I am the kind of person that either stress eats too much, or totally forgets to eat until its 10pm and I have a killer food headache. Working out in the morning 1- gets me up in time to get breakfast from the dining hall 2- makes me more cautious about what I’m eating. If it took everything in me to stay on that treadmill for 30 minutes there is no way I’m going to waste all that effort on a sugary breakfast.
It helps me make healthier food choices and not eat as much
A significant number of people I know go on 2 meals a day instead of 3, and usually those meals are bigger than the normal 3. It seems more ok to get a sandwich, fries and a cookie because you haven’t eaten yet today but actually these kind of meals make it really easy to overeat. You won’t want to waste that morning workout, so you’ll have the grilled chicken sandwich and maybe some fruit instead. By that time, you’ve had two healthy meals so might as well make it a healthy day and do the same for dinner. Boom, you’re eating healthy.
I haven’t needed to drink as much coffee
Last semester I was running on at least two cups of coffee a day and if I forgot or didn’t have time to make it? Chaos ensued, no work was done, I was snappy. Now, I only have coffee in the afternoons if I know I need to crank out a bunch of work in a short amount of time. Not only does that save me time in the mornings, but now I don’t have to spend as much money on coffee!! A win win situation really.
Plus, not a lot of people are at the gym that early, so you can suffer in peace and not be judged by the gym rats!!!!
I know I might sound crazy, but don’t knock it till you try it gals !!!