Part Three
Staying Fit/Staying Personal

By Pam Granata

How do you stay motivated? How do you stay fit? Where’s my personal trainer when I need him? I asked myself all of those questions the day after my sessions ended with David and Cindy Dentel of Fitness Creators Studio.

I know how to stay fit. I just had to continue my walking schedule, my strength training, and throw in staying flexible. Because I have a walking partner four days a week, I don’t have a problem with staying motivated to walk. I look forward to those times, whether it is 6am and cold or 5pm and raining. We just show up! We have fun. We are accountable to one another, and neither one of us wants to call to cancel.

As far as staying flexible, I have found a yoga program on the Oxygen channel called “Inhale” that I just love. It’s a great workout to great music. I usually get in three workouts a week. Once again, it’s fun and the hour flies by.

Now here comes the challenge. How do I make strength-training fun? I know what to do, or at least I thought I did.

Cindy and David helped me put together a home workout. I choose to work out at home because I am not one to go to spas or gyms. I joined these facilities before and wasted a lot of money. I even attended the Cooper Institute and passed its certification course to become a personal trainer. I taught aerobics for years. But I still find it difficult to train myself.

The first week I went down to the basement and warmed up on the Nordic Track for 10 minutes and then proceeded with my home routine. I worked out with the weights I had collected throughout the years. I did my abdominal routine on the ball and even used my Theraband as instructed. Yet, something was missing. The motivation wasn’t there and it was boring. I didn’t have anyone to be accountable to. Being accountable to myself just wasn’t enough. I struggled with this for several weeks. Each week I did less of a workout. I found many excuses: I had to check my email after one set of bicep curls, the phone would ring and I had to answer it instead of letting the voicemail pick up, my plants needed watering. It was too hard to do by myself and soon I was doing less and less. I began to beat myself up for what I considered failing. Why is it easier to get out of bed, get dressed, drive 20 minutes, pay for parking, and pay someone to help me work out?

It took me another three weeks to figure that one out. I still couldn’t hold myself accountable. My motivation was other people. I had to go back to my original reason for hiring a personal trainer. What was that?

I hired a personal trainer to help me get personal and real with myself. So that brings up the real issue. Is this something that I want to continue? If so how can I accomplish this? First, I realized, you have to find out what motivates you. Is it acceptance from others? Is it to look and feel better physically? Is it to be the best you can be? You have to find out what works for you. You may have to experiment with several things. I wasn’t good at sticking to my home routine so I needed to find something that would help me stay on track.

After weeks of struggling I decided that I still needed to be accountable to someone. I wasn’t at a place in my life to hold myself accountable and, instead of feeling guilty about it, I decided to go back to what worked for me. I am now meeting with Cindy or David every other week. I’ve set weekly goals and have been able to meet them. I am back on track now and am able to work out at home with my routine.

So what did I learn during this personal journey? I’ve found you must discover what works for you and embrace it. Don’t give up if the first thing you try doesn’t work. Go back to you original reason for exercising and stay true to yourself. The why must be bigger than the how! You must find something that you will do regardless of the obstacles.