For the past ten years I have never gone a day without completing my daily workout routine – running six miles, performing three sets of fifty squats and box jumps, and finishing up with a light stretch to ease my muscles. Quite impressive, except for the fact that they were all done inside my mind. Physically, the most that I have ever done is maybe walking fast to catch a bus about to leave the bus station. Meanwhile, there I was lying in bed lazily, following Cassey Ho’s Blogilates workout video in my head.
Flashback to my younger days, around the age seven and eight, I was the most energetic, vibrant kid in town – and I speak with full confidence when I say this. The majority of my time was spent on monkey bars, swinging from tree to tree mimicking Tarzan and rarely, if not never, did I spend most of the day lying in bed refusing to move anywhere beyond arm's reach.
My passion for physical activity has always stayed burning within me, but it was never enough to actually get up on my feet, hence the daily workouts that never went beyond imagination. I wrapped my head around the very thing that must have changed during those years that caused myself to decline from possessing energy almost equivalent to that of a semi-gorilla muscleman to a mere couch potato.
The answer was quite simple: Motivation. The seven-year-old me couldn’t wait for the next day to come so she could climb a tree, preferably tall, and take in the beautiful scenery beneath her once she climbed to the top. She looked forward to the cool breeze rushing through her hair and outrunning all of her peers because she was that fast when she ran. For her, running around itself was motivation enough, but as time passed, things got a lot more practical: instead of pure excitement, loud panting noises took its place, physical activities became more of a torment, and she no longer could feel motivation except for the one that begged her to stop to catch a breath.
Numerous attempts have been made to discover what might motivate my current self – all that failed and usually vanished after two days. Just when I thought I reached what seemed like a dead end, I came across a quote from the hit television series and webtoon Misaeng: “If you want to win, your body should be able to withstand the challenges. Will power is nothing much without your physical strength.”
This line sent shivers down my spine. My mind, at the time, was in turmoil juggling multiple extracurricular activities, university classes, and tutoring, all while maintaining relationships with dozens of people. Having been overambitious from day one, I knew letting go of any of these projects would be a cause of depression. However, despite my burning ambition, it was no secret that I was struggling to get work done, procrastinating until the last minute. My work lacked quality and my grades were falling. For some reason, I could not mentally and physically meet all the workload although I was certain it was within my capability.
Encountering this quote, it became crystal clear that my current excitement, the motivation I have so keenly sought for, was building the strength that enabled me to turn my ambition into a fruitful reality. Through this realization, I was able to reclaim the enthusiasm of my 7-year-old self in reestablishing a long lost routine. Workout sessions that usually grew too tiring to continue after the second day became quite the opposite and I indeed have never felt more driven in a very long period of time, because now, for the last couple months, I have never gone a day without completing my daily workout routine.