The "old me" could have wrote a book on exercise avoidance. This morning is a perfect example of a situation where in the past... I would have opted to not exercise but the "new me" figured out a way to make it happen.

Work is backed up by a couple months, but I'm trying really hard to keep the commitment to myself and family to not work weekends or evenings (because I've basically worked 7 days a week since I started to freelance 5 years ago). I've also promised myself not to allow a work backlog to stop me from exercising Monday through Friday (those of you that know me well realize this is a serious priority shift for me). In the past, I've always put my business before my personal well being... there have been situations where I've worked 24 hours straight and felt like I was going to get a nosebleed from sleep deprivation and I forged ahead to meet a client's deadline! But I can't do that anymore... actually... I won't LET MYSELF do that anymore. I still work hard, but not at the cost of my health, happiness and balance.

Last night Nathan wasn't feeling great and I went to bed with him at 9pm. By 11pm I was tossing and turning because he had woken me up crying. After I settled him, I decided to go down to the studio and work because I missed work all Tuesday with personal appointments. I worked until almost 4am and then got up shortly after 6am to start our day. Dropped the boys off at daycare by 7:45am and then realized the boardwalk was still covered in a slippery thin sheet of ice. I took a deep breath and thought... what am I going to do? I'm sleep deprived... I can't do my regular workout because I'll definitely slip... hmmmm but I know I need this right now. I decided to just run around Eastern Passage on a random path instead. I ran 10 minutes at a time and then would walk 2 mins to recover. I did this 4 times and went 7kms in 47 mins and then started my cool down of walking another kilometer to top it out at 8kms in a 1 hour workout... I felt fabulous when I was done.

There was no question this morning that I was going to exercise... I just wasn't sure exactly how I should modify it to accommodate my tired body and my need to run. If you find you are making excuses why not to work out... suck it up princess... unless its an injury the reasons to exercise far outweigh the reasons not to. Deep down... you know it... and I know it.

Just like anything in life... if you want something bad enough... you'll figure out a way to do it.