For the last couple weeks my fitness regimen has been about doing the bare minimum. I have at least 2 days of working out before taking a day off, and when I come back from a day off, I double my knee Physio exercises to make up for the lost day. I do an abdominal exercise between Physio sets. I do my cardio, but don’t push it with respect to effort, (I do this before my Physio). And then I pick just one body part and do three sets of a single exercise for those muscles, and I’m done.

Sometimes we need to just maintain the habit of doing something, without worrying about constantly getting better. Because the alternative is breaking the habit and going backwards. That was my old pattern. Rather than playing the long game of consistently staying healthy and keeping a good schedule, I’d go all-in and dedicate a month or two to ‘getting fit’, then I’d get busy. I’d stop the fitness habit, and ‘let things slide’ until the next health-kick of one to three months comes along… until the next busy schedule when I can’t find the time.

Maintainance mode is tough. It isn’t just going through the motions, it’s an effort that’s actually harder than when you are motivated and push your body hard. It is more difficult to do just one set of something like chin ups, when you are doing it just to get it done, rather than feeling inspired. It’s challenging to not waste time between sets, and to keep going when your heart rate is elevated but your enthusiasm isn’t.

Convincing yourself that you are doing something good for yourself when all you are really doing is maintaining the status quo is uninspiring. But so is doing nothing. So are excuses. So is the feeling of disappointment when you let things slide. Letting things slide is easier. It isn’t better. Sometimes the hard work is just showing up.

The trick is tracking the habit and not breaking it. The key is that you make the cost of breaking the habit feel more painful than not doing so. My motivation to write this is that it’s 6:20am, I’ve been up for over an hour and I haven’t done my workout yet. I am procrastinating and yet I know I’m going to work out. I know that I must… even if my energy level is low. Even if I’m just going through the motions.

Motivation isn’t hard when you are inspired. Motivation is tested when inspiration is lacking. Motivation is easy when you feel enthusiastic, but not when it is driven by a desire to just keep the habit going. That’s when the excuses creep in. What’s one more day off going to hurt? Turns out it’s easy to make that justification in the moment, but it ends up being a deal breaker; It changes a habit into an old habit; It undermines future goals and possibilities.

Maintainance mode sounds like you are just turning on the cruise control and letting things happen on their own… just going through the motions. In fact, maintainance mode is a slog, it’s work, it’s staying the course when you want to drift. It’s the hard work of being motivated when motivation is lacking. It’s the difference between keeping a habit and remembering the habit you wish you kept.

Now it’s time to work out.