I love to travel, but I hate to pack. The process of making a list, folding clothing into piles, and searching for matching socks and half-used tubes of toothpaste absolutely overwhelms me. So I look for an excuse — any excuse — to avoid it. In fact, I’m starting this article a week before the deadline because I’m procrastinating packing for a weekend getaway. An hour before we leave on our trip, I’ll haphazardly shove clothes and toiletries into a bag and hope for the best. But I get the job done and it’s never really as bad as I thought it would be.

For some, the same is true for physical fitness. They love to achieve or maintain a healthy body weight, but loathe setting aside time to exercise. The thought of waking up earlier, donning workout clothes, sweating for half an hour, and then going off to work (hey, wasn’t THAT work?) seems overwhelming. But just like matching up those first few pairs of socks, those first few steps are the hardest part. After that, you warm up, find your rhythm, and you start to feel like maybe this is worth it after all.

Whether you’re a new exerciser, a regular fitness junkie, or someone who’s making changes to an existing exercise program, occasional obstacles are inevitable. Maybe all the treadmills are in use. You forget to put your shorts in your gym bag. The swimming pool is closed for cleaning. There’s no place to park. You wake up and get dressed to go hiking, and you step outside, only to discover a monsoon is in progress. The battery on your portable headset dies during the first few blocks of your four-mile run.

The challenge is to not let these obstacles become excuses. Don’t cheat your body out of the exercise it deserves. Find whatever it takes to get the job done. If you have allocated 30 minutes for your morning run, and you end up spending 10 minutes of that time helping your daughter finish a school project that she failed to mention the night before, don’t give up on your run altogether. Get out there for 20 minutes, and call it a success. If you miss your scheduled exercise class by 10 minutes due to traffic delays, drive to the gym anyway and work out on your own.

I haven’t seen any scientific studies on this, but I suspect that the first five minutes of exercise are generally the toughest mentally. Whether you’re stepping outside on a dark, cold morning, plunging into an icy swimming pool, or collapsing onto your stationary bike after a grueling day at the office, the mind and body just might not be cooperating at first. But stay with it. Don’t give up. Starting is more than half the battle.

Try these strategies to help you clear the occasional exercise hurdles:

• Keep a complete set of clean workout clothing and shoes in your car at all times. This way, if you forget something in your gym bag, you can draw from your backup supply.
• If you’re planning to go exercise after work, say so. Although you really only need to be accountable to yourself, telling others will help you stick with your plans.
• Along those lines, make plans to work out with a buddy a few times a week. And if your buddy cancels, that’s not an excuse for you to cancel as well!
• If you currently don’t have a workout routine and are open to anything, exercise in the morning. That way, you’ll have one less thing to think about and plan for during the day. If a crack-of-dawn alarm seems impossible, strive to go to bed a half hour earlier.
• If you prefer evening exercise, use the reminder/alarm system in your computer calendar at work to alert you that it’s time to pack up and go.
• Always have a back-up plan. Think of a scheduling or equipment setback as an opportunity to try a new form of exercise — such as a different machine at the gym, a different class, or even doing basic calisthenics in your own living room.
• If you work out on your own, treat yourself to a new CD or video periodically. Sometimes music and visual distractions make a world of difference. Some people tape their favorite TV shows and watch them from their home exercise machines.
• If you generally work out at home after work, then do it before you do anything else. Do not open the mail, turn on the television, open your briefcase, answer the phone (if you can avoid it), or go anywhere near the kitchen. Have your clothes set out in advance, change, and go!

The opportunities are endless, and the time is there. Remember, your day is what you make of it. And even on the most daunting of days, once you finish your workout, you will be glad that you did.

Published in May 2004 Arizona Women Lawyers Association, Perspectives.