Me V's Me - life lessons from my spin bike

Nearly every time I choose to exercise, I trigger my sulking child self at the same time.

It goes like this

‘I’m too tired, I’m not doing it, I hate it, it will be awful, I’m just not doing it, I have much more important things to do (like tidying the sock draw – I mean seriously Colleen). I don’t need to do it, I will do it tomorrow

and on and on ad nauseum.

I have to fight sulking child me with determined me. It seems like the fight is a million interactions of ‘I’m not doing it’ vs ‘yes you are’ and carries on until I am sat on my bike.

Sometimes victory belongs to determined me with the first peddle stroke but sometimes the fight continues well into the workout and I am still mentally moaning and groaning with each movement. Normally I will get exactly 30 mins into the exercise, I am all in and I can quieten sulking me. Determined me then fully takes over and I spend the rest of the workout feeling like a marvellous victory.

I love it so very much when determined me wins the battle over sulking me. It is my most powerful Fortitude reminder which can very simply be articulated as ‘being stronger than my excuses’.

It’s that point of choice where I don’t let sulking me win that fuels my self victory each and every time.

It’s winning the mental battle of me vs me that gives me the inner strength to continue winning in other areas of my life.

Determined me has been a lifetime in development though, it hasn’t just happened. I have taught myself how to use this part of me to my advantage over many years. It’s like a muscle that I have trained – if I use it often it’s strong – if I don’t it’s weak and the many other less than useful parts of me win.

I’ve learned so many self-lessons through exercise, but this is the most valuable one for me. Not just exercising my physical self but also exercising my mental self.

I know that continuously training my determined mental self will support my inner and external strength. My greatest desire is that you can feel this feeling too so here are my top tips:

· JFDI – sometimes you have to simply just make yourself do it so that you can realise the reward of accomplishment at the end

· Get help – I would never have developed my determined self if I hadn’t had some of the best teachers

· Practice with things you actually like – building your determined self isn’t going work if you keep trying to make yourself do something that you hate

· Make you the challenge – it’s not about being better than others – it’s about proving yourself to yourself

I'm here to help you find your determined self and learn how to use it to prove yourself to yourself every damn day

All the love