Trying to exercise more when working from home

Published on 2023-02-07

As a traditionally sedentary person, the work from home revolution didn’t do me any favours in terms of my physical health. Don’t get me wrong, I’m priviliged to be able to work from home because it allows me to live where I want and spend more time with my wife. But one of the main drawbacks I´m experiencing is that working out now requires a lot more discipline.

Just cycling to the office used to give me enough exercise to raise my heartbeat twice a day. And having to spend 8 hours of my day in an office was motivation enough to want to go to the gym on my lunch break a couple times a week. Now I’m at home, which is exactly where I want to be.

Some thoughts on how to solve this

• The key thing is wanting to be healthier in a proactive way. I’ve had to do exercise as rehab for injuries and it’s not fun. A gram of prevention is 1000 times better than a kilogram of cure (I convert all my proverbs to metric).

• How do I turn myself into a “person who exercises”? This is an idea from the book Atomic Habits, where you tie a habit to your personal identity (this is why things like Crossfit are so effective).

• I want to be healthier in order to be a better husband and father. Putting it so simply it sounds stupid: I want to be healthy so I can live as long as possible.

• As a non-sporty, non-competitive person, I don’t enjoy suffering. My wife is the opposite (and that’s why she’s so fit), if she doesn’t suffer it’s not fun for her. I don’t think I can turn myself into someone who enjoys suffering overnight, so I have to strike a balance between the intensity of the activities and how much I enjoy them.

• This is also related to something I heard Andrew Huberman¹ say when talking about dopamine in our brains. It’s not good to spike dopamine as a reward for something we don’t enjoy doing. That only makes us addicted to the reward. It’s important to get enjoyment out of the process, not the end result.

• What about organised sports? I used to enjoy practising Tae Kwon Do as a child, but I moved neighbourhoods (and cities, and countries) and never found another instructor I liked. I used to enjoy playing indoor football with a group of friends, but I live too far away from them now. I enjoy playing volleyball, but I doubt I’ll find 11 other players in my population 900 village in rural Spain. Until I get new ideas, it’s solo sports for me.

• Cycling is an obvious choice: I enjoy doing it, I already have a decent bike, my area has loads of empty roads. This is where discipline comes in, at the moment it’s very easy for me to find excuses not to do it: winter is too cold, summer is too hot, it’s always uphill regardless of the season, etc. I’m working on it, I want to be a “guy who cycles”, but I’m friends with some serious cycling freaks (including a Tour de France winner) and I get massive imposter syndrome from them.

Some things that are working

• Going out for a dog walk at lunch time is a great way to stretch my legs and back, get some sun on me, warm up my feet (I have terrible circulation), listen to a podcast and… actually walk the dogs. I’ve been doing this for a couple of months and it works really well because it serves multiple purposes: I know it’s good for me, I know it’s good for my dogs, it makes my afternoon better because I warm up and clear my mind and I can even use it to gather some firewood. I need to look for more activities with this much bang for my buck.

• Splitting firewood is a great way to warm up, much more efficient than actually burning it. I have a pretty heavy splitting axe, so it’s actually a decent workout for my back and arms muscles. I should aim to split a few logs every time I take a break to drink water or go to the toilet.

• These 10 minute stretching sessions from Strength Side make me feel great. They stretch all the areas a desk jockey like me neglects, they are not so intense I dread doing them and I actually feel great after doing them (I also get to reinforce my “guy who has a man bun” identity). I feel like these routines could be a good gateway into exploring calisthenics and doing more intense strength training.

Some things I’d like to try

• Hang a basketball hoop somewhere.

• Walk to the village (which is over a kilometer uphill) and exercise at the park. Maybe I could use the trip to buy some groceries too?

• It’s also worth noting that it’s currently winter where I live and by the time I finish with my day job it’s already dark outside. As spring comes, I’ll be able to do more farm-related jobs after work hours. We’re in no shortage of physically demanding tasks.