Five in a Row

Today marks the fifth day in a row that I've been to the gym. To back up, it's not like this is a new thing just this week. After a significant hiatus (about a year and a half), I returned to the gymafter having been summoned by the She-Woman on the morning of my 30th birthday. So it's not like I stopped going or anything since that time. But five days in a row is a personal best. Usually I go three in a row, or occasionally four, but never five until today. (How did I celebrate? I bought a new pair of gym shorts, since some of my old ones have holes and I am a lousy seamstress.)

I've come to think of going to the gym more as psychological than physical training and on two different levels: one, it's training the mind to keep going to the gym, training it to get into the habit; and two, it's training the mind to keep pushing even when specific gym activities are hard. I guess this second one is like training the mind to be "the little engine that could ." I suppose overall it's about connecting the physical work of activity to the psychological work of pushing what appear to be physical limitations. (That damn mind body split--gotta heal the rift. In my case, there's been a gaping abyss.) The training seems to be working, at least this week!

Now if only I could bottle that and sell it to the part of my brain that is responsible for my dissertation.