After literal years of practice, how can I still struggle to start a workout session? None of the arguments seem to bite and the body just resists it.

I know it will be fun once I have started. I know it will feel good when I’m finished. I know it is good for me. I know I can do it.

And still I have to push myself to do it.

Looking back, there has been progress. It is actually easier than it used to be. I no longer need to tell myself that I’m allowed to not finish, and I no longer convince myself by picking the shortest videos.

What works? The usual stuff. Committing in advance. (Twice a week, on the weekdays when I work from home, at lunchtime.) Not allowing myself to think about it. (I said I was going to do it, so there’s nothing more to it.) Removing all obstacles and smoothing the way. (Paid subscription, with plenty of videos I’ve tagged as favourites. Gym clothes and equipment in easy reach.)

I am envious of the people who go to the gym with a spring in their step and who look forward to it.

The weather was bleh, my mood was meh. I had no energy and I didn’t want to do anything. So I forced myself to exercise.

I have learned by now that when I least feel like working out – not because I’m physically tired but when I just *don’t want to* – is when I most need to, and will get the most benefit from it. And that was the case today, too. In the afternoon I felt a lot more lively.

FitnessBlender videos, which I was recommended four years ago, are still just the right fit. Sometimes an old favourite works best to motivate me; other times I pick something new because everything else feels boring. Either way, I feel renewed afterwards.

Work is still being very frustrating. Killing all energy and desire to do anything. I nevertheless managed to trick myself into working out, promising myself that I could do the shortest workout I could find, but then ended up doing a 35-minute session anyway. Felt better afterwards.

We brought a pair of dumbbells with us to Estonia so that Ingrid could get some workouts in. And since I was just sitting doing nothing in particular, and the dumbbells were also doing nothing in particular during the pauses between Ingrid’s sets, I joined her and did the same upper-body workout.

There’s convenient bicycle parking just outside the Sortera office. I guess those with more expensive bikes park them in parking garages, but mine isn’t enticing enough to make me worry about anyone taking or damaging it in full daylight in the middle of a street.

The other bikes that mine shares the stand with are all also ordinary, classical city bikes. What I see on the roads is rather different. The classical bikes aren’t so common among commuters any more. Instead, commuters and their bikes are diverging into two extremes. On the one side there are the racers: long men (mostly) clad in Spandex, on skinny bikes with lots of gears. On the other side there are the e-bikers: people dressed in jeans or office wear, casually pedalling on e-bikes. One group focuses on the exercise; the other one on convenience. (And both are willing to pay a fair bit to get it.)

Both groups go quite fast, so the average speed of cycle commuting along the routes I follow has definitely gone up over the years.

For me, the city bike still seems like the best compromise. I like getting exercise while I commute (and really, while the e-bikers move their legs, it’s not like they’re going to break a sweat) and I also like being able to use my bicycle in my everyday life without making a whole deal out of it. I can bike to a store and step off the bike and walk around in normal shoes.

The Urb-it office is on the seventh floor, with grand views over the roofs and squares of central Stockholm.

First thing in the morning, walking up all seven floors is sometimes a struggle. I arrive huffing and puffing, and sometimes a bit dizzy. Sometimes I even take the lift.

After lunch it’s like it’s a whole different set of stairs. Or a whole different me, I guess. I’m fairly racing up the stairs, taking them two at a time without any particular effort.

Early mornings are not my thing. My body needs hours to properly wake up.

Look, an actual workout photo, with no kettlebells in sight!

I know, yet another boring dumbbell photo. (I am bad at remembering to take photos during the workout.) But I am proud of sticking to the workout habit when, some days, I really don’t feel like it.

And that’s only before starting. I still tell myself that I can stop partway through but I never end up taking that out. I do actually enjoy the workouts, and the pleasant muscle soreness afterwards.

I started a habit of exercising for at least 15 minutes a day, keeping it small and achievable to help make it happen. But the low target actually ended up being counter-productive. 15 minutes was so short that even an energetic walk to and from the supermarket was enough, and after a while I was checking the box even though I wasn’t even getting my pulse or breathing up.

New habit: at least 20 minutes of strength training on weekdays when I’m not in the office, or 30 minutes of brisk walking otherwise.

I’ve also been avoiding strength training for a while because the mere idea of stripping off my warm layers in order to change into workout clothes has been unpleasant. But now that I’m doing it again, I was reminded that the workout itself gets me nice and warm, and the effect stays with me for some while after the workout. Net net exercising makes me warmer, as long as I can get over the initial threshold. As with most “hard” things, I just need to get past that initial resistance, and remember how good it will feel afterwards.

The photos of dumbbells are boring, I know, but I did a proper workout, with weights and everything, this week again, and I’m rather proud of that, and I want to revel in that pride for a moment.

Maybe next time I’ll bring out the tripod and try to get some more interesting workout photos.