I was just rereading my last post which I had forgotten was about the gym and was from January, almost ten months ago. Well, as I ended that post, it does help to tell people about whatever you are working on. Plus I want to remember this journey for future reference. I'm working on my Project 66 Days. For me, it's a bit like the Whole30, except, I'm inventing the rules as I go, through trial and error.
Here's the back story. I joined the gym, as I mentioned, in January and found myself sometimes getting the energy benefits but not all the time and waning in my attendance sometimes, and then picking it back up. Basically I was all over the map. As a way to help me, I started recording when I worked out on this small calendar.
As you can see, I didn't start recording until March. I think I was doing pretty well in January and into mid-February, making it into the gym three times a week which I thought was a good amount, especially coming from zero times a week practically. By March, I was forcing myself to go, just to not be giving away money, and trying to get a little of my money's worth. On a side note, another thing I love about my gym is that they have a reverse promotion. Instead of the other gyms, that offer $1 membership for the first three months and then bump up to $100 afterwards, my gym starts high and after three months drops - there is a payout instead of a financial penalty to keep with it. This has helped me a bunch, as you can see, some months weren't great and I started thinking I should cancel for now and then re-up later just to not waste money, but the extra up front cost kept me in check.
By April, I reinvigorated myself to go. I wish I remembered what I did to change things so I could record it as part of my journey. The square box on some of the weekends is me going orienteering and not going to the gym. Still a good workout as I'm outside and running/hiking. I'm guessing this might have been my trigger as April is when orienteering started up for the year.
May, I had a legitimate excuse, I was in Ohio busy helping my mom. I did try to get out for a morning run the first week or so, but I'm still not much of a runner, and I was running around from dawn to dusk so much anyways, I used this as an excuse to put my exercise on hold. Although, i did manage to go to the one orienteering event they had that year in my moms town. How fun is that? I've been orienteering in three states now (MA, NH, OH).
By July, I was slipping again and didn't even want to record my poor performance for the next 8 weeks. I did manage to go to the gym some and was doing outside activities like canoeing and hiking over the summer but nothing consistent or intentional.
Around the end of August, in my perusal of life improvement stuff on blogs and YouTube videos, someone mentioned in passing the term 66 days. I looked it up and there wasn't much out there - so no new program that was storming the Internet. I did find this article though (link here) that explains that the old 21 days to form a habit was never based on any scientific study. It was just an observation of a surgeons from decades ago that got blown up and latched onto. Fast forward and there is a more recent study that quantified the number of days to form a habit from a large study group of subjects. It showed that the habit number varies from person to person and other factors, but that the average number is more like 66 days. Well, as this new info percolated, I went to my first orienteering event on a bicycle on Labor Day weekend, Saturday, September 2.
I had missed it last year and was looking forward to going this year. It was in Lexington, so after packing a lunch, I hopped on my bike and biked to the starting meet up. Near the end of my ride, I was questioning if I would actually do the bike orienteering (there would be a smaller foot course too). I'm not wild about biking on streets, being spoiled by so many great bike paths in my area, and not really trusting drivers. Also, my ride to the event was slightly up hill the whole way and I really should have put a bit more air in my tires (and worked out more/trained). But luckily, when I got there, the excitement of the event overpowered that voice inside that is so good at finding excuses. It was structured as a three hour event, where you try to get as many points as possible and get back within three hours without being penalized for being late.
We had five minutes to study our maps and I picked a general route that hit the controls mainly around Lexington, while simultaneously avoiding steep hills (as much as possible) and busy streets. After the first ten minutes (which had a bit of a hill), I was in lala land. It was marvelous. A beautiful day, minimal traffic (I think everyone was out of town over the long weekend), and I was getting hits of dopamine or whatever, whenever I found a control, and tons of vitamin D, even though I had lathered up with sunscreen. I ended up finding myself ahead of schedule and adding a few extra controls to pick up. I was going at my own pace and just enjoying the journey and exploring the back roads of Lexington and great weather. As I was biking I would grab handfuls of my new go-to snack: a bag of raw almonds and dried fruit. It was prunes at the moment so kept an eye on my consumption as I wasn't near any bathroom facilities and I had learned in my twenties the hard way what happens when you consume a bag of prunes.
I got back with ten minutes to spare and compared notes with another competition, picking up some tips. On my bike ride back home, I stopped and finished off my lunch that I had been too busy to eat most of it. And had a leisurely afternoon. It was almost five hours of bicycling all said, with a bunch of hills, even though I tried to avoid the worst of them. The thing was that I didn't feel anything as I was biking. Maybe winded here and there climbing up a hill but no muscle aches. And then like certain alcohols, much later, it hits, rather crashes over me. That night I woke up an pain. Luckily this had happened once before on another long bike ride with my dad, so I knew it didn't warrant a ride to the ER. But man, for someone who has never been a big sports person, this whole lactic acid build up is a b!*&+. I had a brunch get together up in Maine with old friends, two of which are doctors, and they said it was normal and looked at me like I should have experienced this earlier in life by now. Basically you just flush the acid out with water and time. And by Monday I was feeling better and went to the gym.
And this is when the 66 days, percolating in the back of mind clicked. I need to find my number. No listening to that one inner voice that says you are doing good making it to the gym a few times a week and then comes up with other excuses that build and build. I'm doing my own experiment and going for 66 days, or longer. This post, about my beginning of my project is long enough. Next post is progress so far.
