A Reassessment

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Image by Steve Buissinne from Pixabay
A little while ago I mentioned the fitness assessments that we can have at the gym. I recently returned for another review, and having spent three months working hard at trying to improve my fitness was hoping for an accolade.

Personal health and well-being are not of course competitions, so there was no gold medal, Oscar or public announcement awaiting me.

Of course that hasn't stopped me revelling in the knowledge that I have apparently reduced my metabolic age by another 3 years and succeeded in increasing my muscle mass, albeit only slightly. Sadly I know there is no real way in retirement to recapture the fitness levels of youth and somewhere along the line that muscle mass will presumably start to diminish rather than grow. 

Just at a point where our bodies begin to spring all kinds of frailties, the time and effort needed to try to keep them in shape expand dramatically. Life seems to be a never ending balance between exercising sensibly so as not to strain anything, whilst trying to do sufficient to actually make a difference. "Running to stand still," springs to mind.

The youngest completed her first triathlon at the weekend. I have no desire to emulate her endeavour but how brilliant it would be if I actually felt that I had the ability to do so. 

That's a problem I have with exercise, I always seem to want more from it than is realistically achievable without a great deal more toil and exertion. Does anyone else have these pipe dreams and are we guilty of having expectations way beyond our input and just deserts? 

Cycling for 10 minutes and expecting to be slim as a result is like climbing a mountain, failing to make the summit and being disappointed that you can't see the view from the top. I know it's unreasonable to expect that after decades of neglecting fitness for other priorities whilst working, it should suddenly be gained without any hardship and sacrifice on my part. I just sometimes wish it wasn't so difficult and slow going.

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